Using Colour

If you can see this text, it means you are probably using Netscape Navigator 4X, an older version of Internet Explorer, or other browser. My intention is to use CSS layout, but still make the content available to everyone.

Using Colour

One of the easiest ways to make your web page accessible is in your use of colours. Providing a good contrast between your text and the background colour is important.

I find white text on a black background is best for me, my eyes are very sensitive to light and white tends to produce a lot of glare on a monitor. Many people suggest a white background with black text and blue for links as a good colour scheme for accessibility but trying to provide strong contrasts should in general be enough.

Using backgrounds

Be subtle, don't use anything that could interfere with the ability of users to read the text, use the same principles as you would use for a plain colour background - high contrast and don't use fussy designs.

Make the background image a tile for quicker download speeds. Most people tend to use a square tile, the size depends on the pattern repeat but try to make it as small as you possibly can.

Colour Depth

Although the colour depths used by most people now seems to be 16, 24 or 32 bit there are still some using 256 colours so it is well worth taking this into consideration. When you are building your site, change to 256 colours to see how it looks.