Why AI and Accessibility Are Now UX Priorities

As internet designers, we’ve been taught to prioritize human-centered design. However the internet’s latest customers aren’t folks in any respect – they’re clever brokers.

Whether or not it’s a voice assistant navigating your website, an AI mannequin summarizing your product pages, or an autonomous agent reserving a visit on behalf of a consumer, digital experiences are not constructed simply for people. They’re additionally being parsed, interpreted, and acted upon by AI.

This shift is introducing a brand new layer to UX: AX, or Agent Expertise.

What Is Agent Expertise (AX)?

Agent Expertise is the observe of designing web sites which are legible, navigable, and actionable for AI brokers, not simply visually interesting to human customers.

Consider agentic AI as a brand new form of consumer. These fashions can set targets, make selections, and carry out multi-step duties on somebody’s behalf. However not like a human clicking by your interface, they want construction and indicators to make sense of what’s in entrance of them.

In case your website isn’t constructed to be interpreted by an agent, it might as effectively be invisible.

Examples of Agentic AI within the Wild:

Journey bots that browse and e book journeys throughout a number of web sites
AI purchasing assistants that assemble outfits or make product suggestions
Healthcare brokers that pre-fill affected person varieties or schedule appointments
Customized GPTs designed to navigate your website like a high-speed consumer

These brokers depend on machine-readable patterns, not simply visible cues. They usually’re gaining traction rapidly.

Designing for Each: The Intersection of AX and Accessibility

Right here’s the place it will get fascinating: designing for AI usually overlaps with designing for accessibility.

Why? As a result of each AI brokers and accessibility instruments (like display readers) depend on construction, readability, and metadata, not visuals. Semantic HTML, clear hierarchies, alt textual content, and ARIA attributes serve each audiences.

Whenever you construct a web site that’s accessible, you’re additionally serving to AI perceive it. And vice versa.

Finest Practices for Designing for AX (and AI-Pushed UX)

Let’s break down the basics of constructing AI- and accessibility-ready experiences.

1. Use Semantic HTML, Not Simply

s

Tags like

,
,

, and

inform machines what every part of the web page is for. A

is only a container; whereas semantic tags give that means.

Consider it this manner:

= “this exists”

= “it is a self-contained piece of content material”

That that means issues for each display readers and AI brokers attempting to grasp your structure.

2. Add ARIA Attributes and Good Alt Textual content

ARIA roles, labels, and landmark tags assist talk objective, particularly when native HTML falls quick.

Alt textual content shouldn’t simply describe what’s seen, it ought to talk what’s necessary. AI fashions use this metadata to construct context.

3. Embrace Structured Information Like llms.txt

Similar to robots.txt tells crawlers what pages to entry, the rising llms.txt proposal helps giant language fashions (LLMs) perceive which content material to ingest and the way.

A effectively achieved llms.txt file can make clear:

Which pages are AI-friendly

What codecs you need listed

Which areas ought to be excluded or labeled for particular remedy

Please notice that not all LLMs comply with llms.txt tips at the moment. Implementing this technique indicators your intent, and helps future-proof your content material as these requirements evolve and turn out to be extra concrete.

4. Prioritize Heading Hierarchy

H1, H2, H3, and past aren’t simply visible. They supply a logical define of your content material. Correct heading construction improves navigation for assistive instruments and helps LLMs summarize or extract info precisely.

Keep away from skipping ranges (e.g., going from H1 to H4) and ensure every web page has one clear

Some AI brokers (and display readers) nonetheless wrestle with heavy JavaScript. Whereas frameworks like React or Vue are commonplace, ensure your most necessary content material (headings, physique copy, key CTAs) is rendered within the HTML, not loaded later by way of JS.

6. Implement Schema Markup

Add structured information utilizing schema.org codecs (Product, Article, FAQ, and so on.) to explain your content material in a means machines can rapidly parse. This not solely improves search engine optimization however helps LLMs and bots reply consumer queries extra precisely utilizing your website’s information.

Future-Proofing Your Web site: Why This Issues Now

Google’s Search Generative Expertise (SGE) is already utilizing generative AI to summarize content material immediately in search outcomes. OpenAI’s GPTBot and comparable crawlers are indexing the online to be used in large-scale language fashions. And new rules (like the EU’s AI Act) are beginning to take form round transparency and information dealing with.

On this new atmosphere:

Websites with out construction might not present up in AI summaries

Content material with out metadata could also be misrepresented

Options with out fallback textual content might turn out to be useless ends for customers who depend on assistive tech or AI interfaces

Designing for AI and accessibility isn’t simply good observe – it’s changing into important for visibility, usability, and fairness.

UX That Goes Past the Display screen

Person expertise doesn’t cease on the display anymore. Whether or not it’s a display reader or an autonomous agent, your website is being skilled in new ways in which don’t depend on visuals or clicks.

By adopting greatest practices that serve each people and machines, you’re not simply checking accessibility bins. You’re constructing resilient, discoverable, and inclusive digital experiences which are prepared for the following technology of customers.

Whereas freelancing as a graphic and internet designer, Callum was requested to not solely design but additionally construct a web site. That led him to find Webflow, and sparked the launch of Composite. As one of many earliest consultants on the platform, he rapidly constructed a fame for delivering high-impact Webflow websites, finally rising a tight-knit workforce centered on fusing strategic UX with visible excellence. composite.world

The Home of WEBFILMBOOKS

Why AI and Accessibility Are Now UX Priorities

What Is Agent Expertise (AX)?

Examples of Agentic AI within the Wild:

Designing for Each: The Intersection of AX and Accessibility

Finest Practices for Designing for AX (and AI-Pushed UX)

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