• Success Criterion 1.1.1
  • Conformance level A

Decorative Bullet Symbols Read Aloud by Screen Readers

1.1.1 — Non-text Content

Scenario

Setting

A survey tool's question builder

What’s wrong

Decorative Unicode glyphs used as visual bullets or dividers (■ ▶ ✦) announced literally by screen readers ("black square") with no aria-hidden (code hiding content from screen readers) handling.

Example 

<p>■ Multiple choice</p>
<p>■ Short answer</p>
<p>■ Rating scale</p>

Why it matters

Someone building a survey by screen reader hears a symbol name announced before every question type, adding noise to every item.

How to test

Check bullet/divider glyphs (■ ▶ ✦ used as list markers) with a screen reader: if it announces 'black square' or similar instead of staying silent, it fails.

How to fix

Use real list markup instead of typed bullet characters. A browser's own bullet styling is handled sensibly by screen readers, unlike a manually typed Unicode glyph.

<ul>
  <li>Multiple choice</li>
  <li>Short answer</li>
  <li>Rating scale</li>
</ul>

Outcome

A survey builder hears each question type once, cleanly, and picks the right one without extra noise.

Who is affected

Screen reader users browsing any manually-bulleted list of options hear the noise a real list would avoid.

Learn more

Related scenarios