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Accessibility · Real audit
I audited my own portfolio. It failed.
The WCAG issues I found on my old site and how I fixed each one.
Pooja Dodia
·
3 Nov 2026
·
5 min read
Tested with
Lighthouse, axe DevTools, VoiceOver, a keyboard and a phone. Re-tested November 2026.
01
Why I audited my own site
My old site looked bold but failed basics I design for every day: tiny grey text on black, headings used for styling, images without alt text and no way to contact me.
So I treated it like a client project: audit, prioritise, redesign, rebuild in code and measure.
Lighthouse · Accessibility
94
→
100
New home page, dark theme
axe issues
7
→
0
Light and dark, desktop and mobile
02
What I found
The old home page scored 94 in Lighthouse. Looks like a pass. But the score missed what a person notices in seconds, so I tested by hand too.
✕
Links with no name
A screen reader announces “link” but not where it goes.
✕
Body copy at 10.2px
Across 20 blocks of the home page. Hard to read for anyone, impossible for some.
✕
Paragraphs tagged as headings
Several H1s per page, so screen reader navigation made no sense.
✕
Missing alt text
Most images had empty alt text or a raw filename.
✕
No way to get in touch
The contact section only offered a CV download.
“Auditing my own work was humbling.”
03
How I fixed each one
I ordered fixes by who they stop, not by how easy they are. A recruiter who cannot contact me is a bigger problem than an inconsistent spelling.
✓
16px body text
On a clear scale from 11px labels to 175px display.
✓
One H1 per page
Headings in order, every case study tile labelled.
✓
Real alt text for every image
Plus a skip link, visible focus states and Reduce Motion support.
✓
Contrast fixed
Lifted the faint grey on project names and darkened the light-mode orange to #A05D00 (4.6:1).
The first re-test took Lighthouse from 94 to 97 and axe from 7 issues to 6, all from one grey. Lifting that grey and darkening the orange took axe to 0 issues in both themes, and Lighthouse to 100.
04
What I do now
The issues were the same ones I catch in other people’s designs, which is exactly why a checklist and real testing matter more than good intentions. Every project now gets an accessibility check before hand-off: contrast, headings, alt text, keyboard and screen reader.
