How much does a website accessibility audit cost? Published prices, cost drivers and how to compare quotes

The short answer

Most accessibility vendors don't publish prices. The few that do put a manual audit of a small or mid-size website in the low thousands of US dollars. Accessible.org says most of its audits cost USD 1,250–2,750. WebAIM says most of its initial evaluations come out between USD 2,000 and 8,000, a few hours of consultation included. Level Access, Deque and TPGi don't publish prices; they quote each project.

An audit is the first of three budgets. Fixing what it finds (remediation) and keeping it fixed (retests and monitoring) are priced separately, so ask for all three before you compare totals.

What moves an audit quote is the sample: how many distinct templates, screens and complete user flows are tested, against which version of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), on which devices and assistive technologies, and what you need at the end: a report, a retest, a conformance report for buyers.

This guide was checked against vendors' pages and official texts on 15 October 2026. It is a planning aid, not legal advice.

Published accessibility audit prices in 2026

These are the vendors whose own pages state a price or say plainly that they don't. Prices are in US dollars as published; what each one covers differs, so read the second column before the third.

Three things stand out. Vendors price either per page or screen in the sample or per project, so ask for the sample before comparing totals. The standard matters: one published offer tests against WCAG 2.1 AA only, and another charges 10% more for 2.2 AA. And retests are either included (Level Access, thefrontkit's two larger tiers) or billed by the hour (WebAIM).

What an audit price usually leaves out

These lines often appear as extras. The examples are the published prices we found; other vendors may bundle or price them differently.

What drives the cost of an accessibility audit

The sample, not the page count

Auditors don't test every page. The W3C's evaluation methodology, WCAG-EM 2.0 (a W3C Group Note of 23 July 2026), describes five steps: define the scope, explore the site, select a representative sample, evaluate it and report. The structured sample covers the common page types, the essential functionality and the technologies the site relies on. A random sample of 10% of the structured sample is added to check that it is representative: 80 structured samples plus 8 random ones in the W3C's own example.

That is why a 500-page blog built from four templates can cost less to audit than a 20-screen web app where every screen is different. Accessible.org makes the same distinction in its price list: a content-rich or interactive page costs more than a light one, such as a privacy policy.

Complete user flows

WCAG's conformance requirements apply to full pages and to complete processes, and WCAG-EM includes every step of a process in the sample. If your site has a checkout, a sign-up, a booking or a logged-in account area, each one is tested from start to finish. Expect to provide test accounts, a staging environment or a payment sandbox, and expect each flow to add to the quote.

WCAG 2.1 or 2.2

WCAG 2.2 became a W3C Recommendation on 5 October 2023. It adds nine success criteria, six of them at Levels A and AA (Focus Not Obscured (Minimum), Dragging Movements, Target Size (Minimum), Consistent Help, Redundant Entry and Accessible Authentication (Minimum)), and removes 4.1.1 Parsing as obsolete. The W3C says content that conforms to 2.2 also conforms to 2.1 and 2.0, so testing to 2.2 AA also covers the 2.1 AA level that the US Title II rule names.

The extra criteria cost a little more to test. Accessible.org prices WCAG 2.2 AA at 10% more than 2.1 AA; its own example moved a desktop-only quote from USD 1,150 to USD 1,265.

Devices and assistive technology

Each extra environment is more testing time: desktop and mobile, iOS and Android, and the screen readers your audience uses, such as NVDA or JAWS on Windows, VoiceOver on Apple devices and TalkBack on Android. Accessible.org audits on desktop unless mobile is added. Vispero, where TPGi's audit page now redirects, lists testing with JAWS, ZoomText and Fusion. Ask which combinations are in the quote.

How much is tested by hand

An automated scan is the cheap part, and it is not an audit. The W3C puts it plainly: "Tools cannot check all accessibility aspects automatically" (Selecting evaluation tools). Keyboard order, focus visibility, screen reader announcements, error messages and whether alternative text makes sense all need a person. Quotes differ most in how many hours of that manual work they include, and who does it.

What you need at the end

A remediation report for your developers is one deliverable. An Accessibility Conformance Report is another: it is a completed ITI VPAT, a free template now at version 2.5Rev (April 2025) in four editions: Section 508, EU (EN 301 549), WCAG and international. If you sell software to government or enterprise buyers, ask them which edition they expect before you scope the audit.

Retests

Most audits end with a list of issues; the retest confirms the fixes. WebAIM says a follow-up typically takes about half the effort of the first evaluation. Some vendors include one or more retests in the price; others bill them by the hour. Agree how many rounds are included before work starts.

A worked example from published per-page rates

To see how the sample turns into a price, here is an illustration using Accessible.org's published per-page ranges. It is arithmetic, not a quote: the vendor scopes every audit itself, and it says most of its audits land between USD 1,250 and 2,750.

Add a checkout or a logged-in area and the sample grows; add mobile testing, retests or user testing and each becomes its own line.

Audit, remediation and monitoring are three budgets

The audit tells you where the site stands and what to fix first. It doesn't change the site.

Remediation is the fix: code, content and the design system. Fixing a shared component once corrects every page that uses it, which is why a report grouped by component is cheaper to act on than a page-by-page list. Your own developers can do it, with the auditor reviewing their work, or the vendor can, if it offers remediation. Accessible.org's old code remediation rate, USD 250–550 per page or screen, shows that fixing can cost more per page than finding.

Monitoring and retests keep the fixes in place. Automated monitors such as Pope Tech's rescan your pages on a schedule and flag the problems a tool can detect when new content or releases bring them back. They don't replace a manual re-check after a redesign or a new template.

Do the 2026 ADA changes affect what you need?

State and local governments (Title II)

The Department of Justice's Title II rule, published on 24 April 2024 (89 FR 31320), makes WCAG 2.1 Level AA the technical standard for the web content and mobile apps of state and local governments. On 20 April 2026, DOJ published an interim final rule (91 FR 20902), effective the same day, that moved the compliance dates by about a year:

The technical standard did not change. Comments on the interim rule closed on 22 June 2026. The ADA.gov fact sheet also reminds governments that contractors providing public services for them have to follow Title II, so agencies, vendors and nonprofits running government services are in scope.

Two things to watch. The National Federation of the Blind sued DOJ and HHS on 21 May 2026 in the US District Court for the District of Maryland, challenging the extensions. And DOJ may revise the rule further. As of 15 October 2026 the Federal Register shows no later DOJ action on it; check again before you plan around the dates.

Businesses (Title III)

No federal regulation sets a web standard for private businesses. DOJ's 2022 guidance says the ADA applies to the goods and services businesses offer online and names WCAG as helpful guidance. Our article on ADA website compliance covers what that means in practice. For a business, an audit against WCAG 2.2 AA is the practical yardstick.

Why an overlay is not an audit

An overlay is a script added to your pages that promises to fix accessibility automatically. In April 2025 the Federal Trade Commission approved a final order requiring accessiBe to pay USD 1 million. The FTC's complaint alleged that its accessWidget plug-in did not make all user websites WCAG-compliant. The order bars the company from claiming that its automated products can make any website compliant, or keep it compliant, without evidence, and from presenting paid endorsements as independent reviews.

An overlay leaves your source code as it was, so the barriers an audit would find are still in it. If a proposal bundles a widget with the "audit", ask what is tested by hand.

How to compare accessibility audit quotes

Send every vendor the same scope, then compare line by line.

Be wary of three things: a "compliance certificate" issued from an automated scan, a price set by total page count with no sample listed, and a monthly widget sold as the fix.

Where Dardo fits

Dardo's web accessibility audit starts at USD 690: WCAG 2.2 AA, an automated scan plus manual keyboard, screen reader, zoom and contrast tests, and a prioritized report. The final price follows the sample we agree first (templates, journeys, logged-in areas and documents) and whether fixes and retests are included. Our pricing page lists it with our other published prices, and you can send us your site for a scoped quote.