Inclusive Design: Definitions, Principles & Examples

Table Of Content

• Inclusive Design vs Universal Design vs Design For All vs Accessibility: Related but Distinct Concepts
• Think about the different types of diversity
• Inclusive Design: Creating Better Experiences for All
• Universal design
• How to Use Personas to Start Thinking About Accessibility
• Browse UX / UI Design Topics

Around the world, there are many variations of surnames; however, Last Name form fields don’t always accommodate them. Restrictions like character limits, no hyphens, or restrictions on names that are spelled the same as inappropriate English words can make some people feel excluded. When designing websites, there are some well-known standards and guidelines you can follow to ensure that you’re not excluding users on the basis of ability—the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) is a great place to start. Contact with users becomes even more necessary when designing for user groups we don’t know. Design and accessibility expert Kat Holmes talks about designing with users as an essential part of the process. If we want to make sure that the experience we design delivers value to everyone who might benefit from it, we need to design with excluded communities rather than for them.

Inclusive Design vs Universal Design vs Design For All vs Accessibility: Related but Distinct Concepts

That's why it's crucial to consider as many scenarios as possible and design systems and solutions that work for everyone. Humans are complex, and diversity itself is not something with a direct definition. But there is no one type of person, so in using this icon, I would be excluding any person (including myself) who doesn’t look like it. With this in mind, I might consider a different person or multiple people… or use another visualization technique entirely.

Think about the different types of diversity

Another method is to follow the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), as developed by the W3C (directed by inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee) and inspired by the UN convention principles. Businesses have an opportunity — and a responsibility — to widen their lenses when considering whom their products are designed for. Inclusive product design aims to facilitate a match between the product and a diverse set of users, which can cultivate wins for the business, customers, and society in the process.

Inclusive Design: Creating Better Experiences for All

Companies like Google have integrated accessibility principles seamlessly into their design language. Here’s an example of how Material Design has seamlessly woven accessibility standards into Google’s design language. If you’re new to the world of UX design, don’t assume that inclusive design is an “advanced topic”!

Examples of inclusive design

Consider offering alternative input methods for users with limited mobility. Something as “small” as images can be a huge step towards inclusive design. Its prominent headline “Making Commerce Better for Everyone” and the subtitle, “...supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs, the world’s biggest bands, and everyone in between.” reinforce this ideology. Good design aims to create a great user experience for everyone who touches it.

Universal design

By understanding that accessibility is about more than just optimizing your code, you’ll find you can build it into your design process. This will ensure you are taking a disability advocacy approach, and keeping the focus on your users throughout the development process. Regularly test your designs with users, including those with diverse abilities and backgrounds. Use their feedback to improve the accessibility and inclusivity of your product. Iterate and refine your designs based on user insights and evolving accessibility standards.

As designers, we need to plan and design for accessibility in UX projects. We have the responsibilities, not only to our profession but also to our users and society, to design accessible digital solutions. One simple method of including accessibility in our UX projects is to assign a disability to one of the personas.

Starbucks is updating its cafes to be more accessible with new inclusive designs - Nation's Restaurant News

Starbucks is updating its cafes to be more accessible with new inclusive designs.

Posted: Fri, 16 Feb 2024 08:00:00 GMT [source]

For example, it’s not just about images that have high contrast and alt text for screen readers. For example, you practice inclusive design through clear and unambiguous messages that depict a diverse group of people. You make your target users feel welcome because you include them from your designer’s research right through to user testing. In the process, you learn to recognize exclusion in web design and far beyond. Rather than creating adaptations for barriers that might exist within a product, UX designers can create better designs by removing as many barriers as they can. The result will be products that are more inclusive, work better, create more engaging user experiences, and also satisfy accessibility requirements.

Browse UX / UI Design Topics

For websites and the built environment, the target population is generally the whole population, in which case all three approaches have an equivalent meaning. Failure to correctly understand people can result in products that cause unnecessary frustration and exclusion, which reduces commercial success because of increased returns and customer support. Accents trigger certain associations with race, culture, socioeconomic status, etc. While we cannot escape this, it’s up to us to choose to iterate on existing stereotypes or not.

UX is based on the belief that users should be the primary stakeholder, at the center of everything we do as we shape products and solutions for them. Twitter error messages for its sign-up form are readable and understandable. The error messages are written in Standard English with no jargon or acronyms. Also, the error messages are marked in a red colour and placed next to the input fields.

Microsoft's Inclusive Design Toolkit illustrates how to apply inclusive design to support many different goals and outcomes. For example, when designing for inclusivity, it's important to consider the needs of a user who is blind but also someone who might have just had laser eye surgery or is trying to read something on their phone on a sunny day. If you’re not sure whether the materials you’re creating are accessible, you can consult the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.

A product design team made up of people with different cultural backgrounds, varying abilities, and different gender identities is more powerful than a team of people who look, behave, identify, and think in the same ways. So find ways to build a diverse team that’s capable of noticing and designing solutions for a broader range of user needs. This is why understanding the scope and complexity of inclusive design is essential for aspiring tech professionals.

However, some general ways to ensure you're being cognitively inclusive are to not overcrowd your product pages with information, and to write content for a grade 7 reading level, avoiding jargon and complex terminology. The initial Band-Aid example highlights a great case of how a company could and should consider a range of individuals and their ethnic backgrounds. Not only should the products we create consider cultural diversity, but so should the media we consume, from movies to commercials to marketing materials. If the goal is to resonate with your audience, remember that your audience doesn't fit one specific group, and you'll need to be intentional about how to be inclusive.

User diversity covers variation in capabilities, needs and aspirations. When you understand the needs of your users, you can come up with some delightful ways to satisfy those needs. For example, Pinterest, an image-sharing app, released a new feature which allowed users to filter based on some nontraditional options  — for example, by hair pattern  (e.g., protective, curly, straight). Though this pattern may seem like a minor addition, it is empathetic to Pinterest’s diverse user base and created an inclusive browsing experience. Finally, Microsoft is a classic example of a company that strives to design according to principles driven by inclusivity (and especially accessibility). Their inclusive design toolkit includes extensive resources on how to design inclusively—including detailed instructions on how to use persona spectrums in your design work.

Check out the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) to review industry-accepted accessibility standards and Apple and Google's accessibility guidelines for more information. It means considering the needs and perspectives of others, taking into account their physical appearance and ability, cognition and education, socioeconomic status, and demographics such as age, gender, and ethnicity. Inclusive design means taking into account the broad spectrum of humanity, including ability, gender, age, experience, race and many other areas. For starters, by offering thousands of diverse options for icons to reflect a range of skin tones and cultural backgrounds. While some might assume it would be just as effective if every character were white, it’s unlikely the audience would agree. The prevalence data and definitions of difficulty levels are drawn from the Microsoft (2003) survey.