A plain guide to designing for people who are color blind
TetraLogical, an accessibility consultancy, published a practical guide to making websites, charts, and graphics readable for people with color blindness, which the article says affects about one in 12 men and one in 200 women. Its core rule comes from WCAG, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines: color should never be the only way information is shown, so pair it with an icon, pattern, or text label. It flags red-green and blue-purple pairings as risky and suggests checking whether a design still works in greyscale.
- For
- Detroit creatives and small business owners who make their own websites, menus, logos, charts, or social graphics and want them readable for customers with color vision differences.
- Cost
- Free to read as a public blog post on TetraLogical's site. The article does not state a cost for the Coblis color blindness simulator it mentions. TetraLogical also offers paid accessibility assessments, with no prices listed.
- Access
- Open web article with no sign-up or account requirement shown. The article notes that simulators like Coblis only approximate color blindness and recommends usability testing with real people when possible.
Your moveRun your site, logo, or a key chart through a simulator such as Coblis, or view it in greyscale, then add a text label or icon anywhere color alone carries meaning, such as a red error message.
Start here