HTML page title is descriptive
Description
This rule checks that the first title in an HTML web page describes the topic or purpose of that page.
Applicability
This rule applies to the document title of each html web page , except if one of the following is true:
- The html web page has no document title ; or
- The document title contains only whitespace text nodes .
Expectation
The target element describes the topic or purpose of the overall content of the document .
Assumptions
There are currently no assumptions.
Accessibility Support
-
This
rule
assumes
that
browsers
only
recognize
the
first
title
element if multipletitle
elements are present in the document . Testing shows that this in general is the case. Therefore the scope of this rule is limited to only checking the firsttitle
element in a document.
Background
The
title
elements
of
embedded
documents,
such
as
those
in
iframe
,
object
,
or
svg
elements,
are
not
applicable
because
those
are
not
web
pages
according
to
the
definition
in
WCAG.
The
HTML
specification
-
The
title
element
requires
documents
to
only
have
one
title
element;
and
title
elements
to
be
children
of
the
head
element
of
a
document.
However,
current
HTML
specification
also
describes
what
should
happen
in
case
of
multiple
titles,
and
titles
outside
the
head
element.
Because
of
this,
neither
of
these
validation
issues
causes
a
conformance
problem
for
WCAG.
Related rules
Bibliography
- Understanding Success Criterion 2.4.2: Page titled
- Technique G88: Providing descriptive titles for Web pages
- Technique H25: Providing a title using the title element
Accessibility Requirements Mapping
-
2.4.2 Page Titled (Level A)
- Learn more about 2.4.2 Page Titled
- Required for conformance to WCAG 2.0 and later on level A and higher.
-
Outcome
mapping:
-
Any
failed
outcomes: success criterion is not satisfied -
All
passed
outcomes: success criterion is satisfied -
An
inapplicable
outcome: success criterion needs further testing
-
Any
-
G88: Providing descriptive titles for Web pages
- Learn more about technique G88
- Not required for conformance to any W3C accessibility recommendation.
-
Outcome
mapping:
-
Any
failed
outcomes: technique is not satisfied -
All
passed
outcomes: technique needs further testing -
An
inapplicable
outcome: technique needs further testing
-
Any
-
H25: Providing a title using the title element
- Learn more about technique H25
- Not required for conformance to any W3C accessibility recommendation.
-
Outcome
mapping:
-
Any
failed
outcomes: technique is not satisfied -
All
passed
outcomes: technique needs further testing -
An
inapplicable
outcome: technique needs further testing
-
Any
Input Aspects
The following aspects are required in using this rule.
Test Cases
Passed
Passed Example 1
This
title
element
describes
the
content
of
the
document.
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>Clementine harvesting season</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>
Clementines will be ready to harvest from late October through February.
</p>
</body>
</html>
Passed Example 2
This
title
element,
the
first
of
two,
describes
the
content
of
the
document.
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>Clementine harvesting season</title>
<title>Second title is ignored</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>
Clementines will be ready to harvest from late October through February.
</p>
</body>
</html>
Passed Example 3
This
title
element,
which
is
within
the
body
,
describes
the
content
of
the
document.
Even
though
it
is
not
placed
within
the
head
element,
as
expected
according
to
the
HTML
specification
,
the
rule
still
passes
because
the
browser
fixes
it
and
it
doesn’t
cause
any
known
accessibility
issues.
<html lang="en">
<head> </head>
<body>
<title>Clementine harvesting season</title>
<p>
Clementines will be ready to harvest from late October through February.
</p>
</body>
</html>
Failed
Failed Example 1
This
title
element
does
not
describe
the
content
of
the
document.
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>Apple harvesting season</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>
Clementines will be ready to harvest from late October through February.
</p>
</body>
</html>
Failed Example 2
This
title
element,
the
first
of
two,
does
not
describe
the
content
of
the
document.
Most
browsers,
and
this
rule,
only
look
at
the
first
title
element.
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>First title is incorrect</title>
<title>Clementine harvesting season</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>
Clementines will be ready to harvest from late October through February.
</p>
</body>
</html>
Failed Example 3
This page has a generic document title . The title contains the website name, but does not describe the page.
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>University of Arkham</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Search results for "accessibility" at the University of Arkham</h1>
<p>None</p>
</body>
</html>
Inapplicable
Inapplicable Example 1
This
title
element
is
a
child
of
an
svg
element.
<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<title>This is a circle</title>
<circle cx="150" cy="75" r="50" fill="green"></circle>
</svg>
Glossary
Outcome
An outcome is a conclusion that comes from evaluating an ACT Rule on a test subject or one of its constituent test target . An outcome can be one of the three following types:
- Inapplicable: No part of the test subject matches the applicability
- Passed: A test target meets all expectations
- Failed: A test target does not meet all expectations
Note:
A
rule
has
one
passed
or
failed
outcome
for
every
test
target
.
When
there
are
no
test
targets
the
rule
has
one
inapplicable
outcome.
This
means
that
each
test
subject
will
have
one
or
more
outcomes.
Note:
Implementations
using
the
EARL10-Schema
can
express
the
outcome
with
the
outcome
property
.
In
addition
to
passed
,
failed
and
inapplicable
,
EARL
1.0
also
defined
an
incomplete
outcome.
While
this
cannot
be
the
outcome
of
an
ACT
Rule
when
applied
in
its
entirety,
it
often
happens
that
rules
are
only
partially
evaluated.
For
example,
when
applicability
was
automated,
but
the
expectations
have
to
be
evaluated
manually.
Such
“interim”
results
can
be
expressed
with
the
incomplete
outcome.
Web page (HTML)
An HTML web page is the set of all fully active documents which share the same top-level browsing context .
Note:
Nesting
of
browsing
context
mostly
happens
with
iframe
and
object
.
Thus
a
web
page
will
most
of
the
time
be
a
“top-level”
document
and
all
its
iframe
and
object
(recursively).
Note: Web pages as defined by WCAG are not restricted to the HTML technology but can also include, e.g. , PDF or DOCX documents.
Note: Although web pages as defined here are sets of documents (and do not contain other kind of nodes), one can abusively write that any node is “in a web page” if it is a shadow-including descendant of a document that is part of that web page.
Whitespace
Whitespace are characters that have the Unicode “White_Space” property in the Unicode properties list .
This includes:
- all characters in the Unicode Separator categories , and
-
the following characters in the Other, Control category:
- Character tabulation (U+0009)
- Line Feed (LF) (U+000A)
- Line Tabulation (U+000B)
- Form Feed (FF) (U+000C)
- Carriage Return (CR) (U+000D)
- Next Line (NEL) (U+0085)
Rule Versions
- Proposed version, 30 August 2023 ( compare )
- Latest version, 30 August 2023
Implementations
This section is not part of the official rule. It is populated dynamically and not accounted for in the change history or the last modified date.
Implementation | Type | Consistency | Report |
---|---|---|---|
Axe DevTools Pro 4.37.1 | Semi-automated tool | Consistent |
|
Trusted Tester 5.1 | Test methodology | Consistent |
|