Knowledge Base

Adding captions to videos and image descriptions (also known as alt-text) to any images you might post is now an expected practice. IDs are so important that the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) have alt-texts/image descriptions as their very first guideline.

Simply, it is a description of an image that’s shown or ‘read’ to people who can’t see the image. IDs can help: 

• people with low vision using a screen reader
  
• people who have turned off images to save data 
  
• search engines
  

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How do I add an image description? 

You’ll be doing this most frequently on social media. Using the Meta Business Suite to admin your Insta and Facebook pages is the easiest way to add image descriptions for your images.

When you’re writing your post for Insta or Facebook, using the Meta Business Suite to post. When you have added your image to the post, a small pencil icon will sit to the right and this is where you can add your alt-text (image description). Then, all you need to do is write out a concise, factual description of what the picture looks like.

If you’d prefer to add image descriptions on your actual posts, beneath the main text, simply period-gap the description until it sits beneath a ‘read more’ tag:

Amazing event description goes here.

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[Image Description: here]

How you describe the image depends on its context. If the image was featured in an article about photography, the ID could be something along the lines of “Close up, greyscale photograph of man outside, face in focus, unfocused background.” 

If the image is on a website about a TV-series, an appropriate alt-text could be completely different, “Star of the show, Adam Lee, looking strained outside in the rain.” 

So, write an ID that is as meaningful as possible for the user in the context they’re in.

Give the necessary information in the alt-text but make it as short and concise as possible. One of the few times you should write long IDs is when you’re describing an image containing important text. Alt text on websites best practice is 125 characters. Our website has a total of 200 characters available.

Don’t start alt-texts with “Image of”, “Photo of” or similar. The screen reader will add that by default.

“Dog jumping through a hoop. Illustration.”

End the alt-text with a period. This will make screen readers pause a bit after the last word in the alt-text.