- Success Criterion 2.1.1
- Conformance level A
Hover-Only Menu With No Way to Open It by Keyboard
2.1.1 — Keyboard
Scenario
Setting
A hospital's patient portal appointment scheduler
What’s wrong
Hover-only menus with no keyboard-open equivalent (submenu items unreachable).
Example
<div onclick="submitForm()">Submit</div>Why it matters
Blind users, people with motor disabilities, and anyone operating the interface without a pointer.
How to test
Tab to a menu trigger (don't hover): if opening the menu requires mouse hover with no keyboard-triggered equivalent, submenu items are unreachable.
How to fix
Open menus on Enter/Space and let arrow keys traverse submenu items.
<button onclick="submitForm()">Submit</button>A native button is focusable and triggers on Enter/Space automatically; a div needs all of that added by hand.
Outcome
On a hospital's patient portal appointment scheduler, this barrier is gone for blind users, people with motor disabilities — they reach the same outcome without extra effort.
Who is affected
Blind users, people with motor disabilities, and anyone operating the interface without a pointer.
Learn more
- Understanding Understanding document (opens in a new tab)
Related scenarios
- Feature That Only Responds to Mouse Events, Not the Keyboard
- Element That Loses Focus the Instant It’s Reached by Keyboard
- Clickable Element Acting Like a Link With No Real Keyboard Role
- Clickable Div With No Keyboard Focus or Key Handling at All
- Focusable Element That Enter and Space Don’t Actually Activate
- Custom Dropdown That Can’t Be Operated by Keyboard Arrows