IBM Equal Access Accessibility Checker

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Introduction

IBM’s Equal Access Accessibility Checker is the set of automated testing tools in the IBM Equal Access Toolkit. The toolkit provides guidance organised by phase (Plan, Design, Develop and Verify), and the checker tools support the Verify phase. The tools and supporting components, including the rules engine, are developed in the IBMa/equal-access repository on GitHub, and the latest release at the time of writing was 4.0.34 on 8 September 2026.

There are two ways to use it. Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox and Edge integrate automated checking into each browser’s developer tools, with visualisations that help users find the source of issues and try fixes. For automation, the Node package accessibility-checker runs accessibility tests in continuous integration and works with test frameworks such as Selenium, Puppeteer and Playwright, while cypress-accessibility-checker wraps it for Cypress.

The accessibility-checker README lists its features: scan single or multiple files, directories or URLs; output results as JSON, CSV, HTML or XLSX; automate testing in CI; integrate with Node-based environments such as Selenium, Puppeteer, Playwright, Jest and Zombie; validate results against baselines; choose a target rule archive; configure policies (rule sets); and set which violation levels fail tests and which are reported. A command-line utility, npx achecker, scans files, directories or URLs listed in a text file. Boilerplates show setups for batch scanning, Cucumber with Selenium, Jest, Jest with Selenium, Mocha with Selenium, Protractor, WebdriverIO and more.

Baselines are a standout feature. You capture a scan result as a baseline, and future scans pass if they match it and fail if they differ. IBM recommends this for false positives, resolved “Needs review” items, issues scheduled for later fixes and catching new regressions, which makes it practical to adopt automated accessibility gates on an existing product without fixing every legacy issue first.

Configuration lives in .achecker.yml at the project root. The default uses the latest rule archive and the IBM_Accessibility policy; you can pin a specific archive for stable results and list multiple policies, such as IBM_Accessibility and WCAG_2_1 (run npx achecker archives to list valid IDs). Fail levels such as violation and potentialviolation control what breaks the build.

How it compares: axe-core is the most widely used open-source engine, and Pa11y offers a simple CLI. IBM’s checker has its own rules engine, rule archives for reproducible results and built-in baselines, making it a strong option for teams that need predictable CI gating. The repository has about 790 GitHub stars and the README asks developers building it locally to use Node.js 22.

The source code is at IBMa/equal-access on GitHub under the Apache-2.0 licence, with about 786 stars; the most recent commit was on 30 October 2026.

Features

1. Browser extensions: Chrome, Firefox and Edge developer-tools integration with visual results.
2. Node accessibility-checker: Automated scans in CI with Selenium, Puppeteer, Playwright and Jest.
3. Cypress wrapper: cypress-accessibility-checker for Cypress test suites.
4. Baselines: Accept known issues and fail only on new regressions.
5. Rule archives: Pin a rule set version for reproducible results.
6. Policies and levels: Choose rule sets and the violation levels that fail or report.
7. Multiple report formats: JSON, CSV, HTML and XLSX output.
8. CLI scanning: npx achecker scans lists of files, directories or URLs.

Pros

1. Free and open source: Apache-2.0 tools backed by IBM.
2. Reproducible CI gates: Rule archives and baselines prevent surprise failures.
3. Free to use: Open source under the Apache-2.0 licence, so the core tool costs nothing to use.
4. Actively maintained: The repository had commits as recent as 30 October 2026.

Cons

1. Smaller community: Fewer integrations and examples than axe-core.
2. Different rule results: Its own rules engine may report differently from axe-based tools, so expect some tuning.
3. Node-focused automation: Automation packages target JavaScript test environments.
4. Automation limits: Manual and assistive-technology testing are still required.

Usage and Links (Example)

Install and scan from the command line:

npm install --save-dev accessibility-checker
echo "https://example.com/" > urls.txt
npx achecker urls.txt

A minimal .achecker.yml (see npx achecker archives for valid IDs):

ruleArchive: latest
policies:
  - IBM_Accessibility
failLevels:
  - violation
reportLevels:
  - violation
  - potentialviolation
outputFormat:
  - html
  - json

Use it inside a Node test (pattern from the project’s README):

const aChecker = require("accessibility-checker");

test("home page is accessible", async () => {
  const result = await aChecker.getCompliance("https://example.com/", "home");
  expect(aChecker.assertCompliance(result.report)).toBe(0);
});

Practical tips:

1. Pin ruleArchive to a specific version in CI and upgrade deliberately.
2. Use baselines to adopt the checker on legacy products, then shrink them over time.
3. Use the browser extension to investigate failures reported in CI.

Resources:

• IBM Equal Access Accessibility Checker website
• GitHub repository
• accessibility-checker on npm

Pricing

IBM Equal Access Accessibility Checker is free and open source under the Apache-2.0 licence.

Recommended for?

1. Teams wanting a free, reproducible accessibility gate in CI, with baselines and pinned rules.
2. Cypress, Playwright, Puppeteer and Selenium users adding accessibility assertions.
3. Developers wanting a free developer-tools extension for Chrome, Firefox or Edge.
4. Not a fit for non-JavaScript automation stacks without extra work.

Conclusion

IBM’s Equal Access Accessibility Checker is a capable, free accessibility testing toolkit whose rule archives and baselines make it especially well suited to dependable CI gating.

Use the extensions for investigation and the Node packages for automation, alongside manual testing.