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Is there such a thing as WCAG certification?

No body certifies websites against WCAG. What a badge, seal or audit letter can honestly claim, and which accessibility certifications are real.

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Pavel Charkasau

No. There is no official WCAG certification for websites. The W3C writes WCAG, but it does not test sites, issue certificates or keep a register of approved ones. Its own conformance logo page says the logos "do not represent review or validation of conformance by W3C and/or WAI", and that "content providers are solely responsible for the use of these logos" (W3C WAI). So when a footer says "WCAG certified", the useful question is who made that claim, about which pages, on what date and after what testing. Somebody can test your site and write down what they found. That is real and worth having. What nobody can do is hand you a WCAG certificate in the sense people usually mean: an independent body vouching that the site conforms, and keeps conforming. The certifications that do exist in accessibility certify people, not websites. Below is what a WCAG certification badge can honestly say, and what a real conformance claim has to contain.

Who certifies websites against WCAG?

Nobody, officially. WCAG 2.2 defines conformance and then leaves the claim to whoever publishes the content. Section 5.3 is titled "Conformance Claims (Optional)", and it opens with "Conformance claims are not required. Authors can conform to WCAG 2.2 without making a claim" (W3C, WCAG 2.2).

That design is deliberate. WCAG is a technical standard, and conformance is a property of specific pages at a specific moment. Change a template, ship a new checkout step, swap a date picker library, and the pages are different pages.

The W3C also says plainly that no tool can settle the question: "No tool alone can determine if a page conforms to WCAG requirements. Sometimes evaluation tools can produce false or misleading results. Knowledgeable human evaluation is required to determine if a page is accessible" (W3C WAI).

The law works the same way. Neither the ADA nor the US Department of Justice's regulations name an approved certification scheme for websites. The European Accessibility Act has no website certificate either. Service providers have to meet the accessibility requirements and publish information, per Annex V, explaining "how the services meet the applicable accessibility requirements" (Article 13(2), Directive (EU) 2019/882). Even for physical products, where the EAA does use CE marking, the manufacturer runs the conformity assessment itself under Annex IV and signs its own declaration of conformity (Article 7(2)). No outside body issues a certificate in that route either.

What does a "WCAG certified" badge actually mean?

A badge is a claim made by whoever put it there. Sometimes that is the site owner. More often it is a vendor whose script or service the site uses. On its own, the image means nothing.

WCAG treats a badge as a conformance claim. Note 3 under section 5.3.1 says: "If a conformance logo is used, it would constitute a claim and must be accompanied by the required components of a conformance claim" (W3C, WCAG 2.2). A logo with nothing behind it does not meet WCAG's own rules for making a claim.

The W3C's logo page adds one more detail that most badges ignore: "By default, a conformance icon refers to a single page" (W3C WAI). A seal in a site-wide footer implies a scope that the evidence rarely covers.

What must a real WCAG conformance claim include?

WCAG 2.2 section 5.3.1 lists the required parts. If you make a claim, it has to include:

  • the date of the claim
  • the guideline title, version and URI ("Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.2 at https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG22/")
  • the level satisfied: A, AA or AAA
  • a concise description of the pages covered, such as a list of URIs, including whether subdomains are in scope
  • a list of the web content technologies relied upon

That is from the standard itself (W3C, WCAG 2.2). Section 5.3.2 recommends extras, including the user agents and assistive technologies used in testing.

Compare that list with a typical seal. A green shield that says "WCAG 2.2 AA" usually has no date, no page list and no technologies. Click it and you get the vendor's marketing page. That is the gap between a claim and a decoration.

For a whole site rather than a handful of pages, the W3C publishes a method for structuring the evaluation: WCAG-EM, the WCAG Evaluation Methodology. It covers defining scope, choosing a representative sample of pages and recording results. An auditor who follows WCAG-EM and writes a dated report has produced something you can rely on. It is still their professional opinion on a sample, at a point in time. It is not a certificate.

Which accessibility certifications are real?

The real ones certify people. Two come up most often.

IAAP credentials. The International Association of Accessibility Professionals runs exams for individuals: CPACC (core competencies), WAS (Web Accessibility Specialist) and CPWA, which "is conferred on those who have earned both CPACC and WAS" (IAAP via Credly). A WAS holder has passed a technical exam on WCAG. Their audit is worth more than an anonymous one. The site they audit is still not certified.

DHS Trusted Tester. The US Department of Homeland Security trains and certifies individuals to run a manual Section 508 test process. Per Section508.gov, "Agencies that adopt the Trusted Tester Process only accept test results from individuals who have been certified as Trusted Testers" (Section508.gov). Again, the person is certified. The test results describe the product on the day of the test.

There are also documents that get mistaken for certificates. A VPAT or Accessibility Conformance Report is a vendor's self-report in a standard format. We covered that in what a VPAT is. Third-party reviewed ACRs exist, but the reviewer is vouching for the testing, not certifying the product.

Why do some vendors sell "WCAG certification" anyway?

Because buyers ask for it, and a seal is easy to ship. The risk sits with whoever publishes the claim.

The FTC's case against accessiBe is the public example of how that goes wrong. The FTC alleged the company said its accessWidget plug-in "can make any website compliant with WCAG", and that the claims were "false, misleading, or unsubstantiated" (FTC, January 2025). The same complaint alleged that accessiBe "deceptively formatted third-party articles and reviews to appear as if they were independent opinions by impartial authors." The final order required a $1 million payment and barred the company from claiming its automated products can make any website WCAG-compliant without substantiation (FTC, April 2025). Our longer write-up is the accessiBe FTC settlement, explained.

Here is where I land. A "certified" badge on a website is a marketing asset for the vendor who drew it, and I would take it down. Replace it with a dated, scoped statement that says what was tested, how, and what is still broken. People who rely on a screen reader don't read your badge. They hit the unlabelled button on step three of checkout.

How should you describe your site's accessibility honestly?

Use an accessibility statement, not a badge. A statement documents your efforts and known gaps. It is not a guarantee, and it shouldn't read like one. A good one names the standard and level you are working towards, the date and method of the last evaluation, the known issues, and a way for people to report problems. Our accessibility statement guide covers the structure, and the free statement generator drafts one from your answers.

Evidence beats seals. In practice that means:

  1. An automated scan with rule IDs and selectors, for example button-name on .cart-drawer > button.close. Automated tools find roughly 30 to 57% of issues, depending on how you count. Deque's study of more than 2,000 audits put it at about 57% by issue volume (Deque).
  2. Manual testing for the rest: keyboard-only passes through every flow, then the same flows with a screen reader. Our WCAG checklist lists the criteria a scanner can't decide.
  3. A dated report that names the pages tested. If you sell into the EU, map your results to EN 301 549, the harmonised standard that covers WCAG for web content.

None of that produces a certificate, and that's fine. It produces a record that holds up when a procurement team or a regulator asks how you know.

FAQ

Is there an official WCAG certification?

No. The W3C publishes WCAG but does not certify websites, and its conformance logos "do not represent review or validation of conformance by W3C and/or WAI" (W3C WAI).

Can I use the W3C's WCAG conformance logo?

Yes, if you make a full conformance claim. WCAG 2.2 says a logo constitutes a claim and must come with the required components: date, version, level, the pages covered and the technologies relied upon (W3C, WCAG 2.2).

Does a "WCAG certified" badge protect me under the ADA or the EAA?

No. Neither law recognises a website certification scheme. What matters is whether people with disabilities can use the service, and under the EAA the provider has to explain how the service meets the requirements (Directive (EU) 2019/882).

What is the difference between IAAP certification and WCAG certification?

IAAP certifies individual professionals, such as WAS and CPWA holders. It does not certify websites, and no organisation offers an official WCAG certification for sites.

Can an automated scan certify my site as WCAG conformant?

No. The W3C states that no tool alone can determine whether a page conforms, and that knowledgeable human evaluation is required (W3C WAI).

Start with what a scan can show

Run a free scan to get the automated findings with the rule, the WCAG success criterion and the exact selector for each. It won't certify anything, and the report says which checks still need a person.

Pavel Charkasau, founder, wcagc.com Last updated: 3 October 2026

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