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For Developers

16 Apr 2026
For engineering teams

Put WCAG in the dev cycle, not in QA

A11y caught in QA is too late. By then you’ve shipped code, burned story points, and face a rebuild. You need scans early—CI/CD, staging, dev branches. API-first. JSON output. Structured findings you can parse, not PDFs you have to read.

Late-stage a11y burns cycles

QA finds violations in week 3. You rebuild in week 4. Now it’s a11y debt. Run scans in CI/CD and fail the build on regressions instead.

Existing tools don’t cover your stack

axe-core + pa11y + manual PDF checks = three different systems, three data formats, incomplete WCAG 2.2 coverage. You need all 77 checks from one API.

Handoff to fix is painful

“Fix contrast on button.” “Where?” Copy findings to a doc, send to your team, lose half the detail. You want one-click handoff to ChatGPT or Claude.

Built for developers

API-first accessibility. Fail the build on regressions.

REST API with JSON payloads. GitHub Actions / GitLab CI / CircleCI integration. Scan from localhost, staging, or prod. Set WCAG budgets and break your deploy pipeline if you exceed them.

REST API

Structured JSON responses. Scan any URL, get back violations with severity, WCAG criteria, and remediation hints. Parse programmatically, no PDFs.

CI/CD integration

GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, CircleCI templates included. Scan on every PR, fail if violations exceed your budget, report inline on the commit.

Fail-on-regression

Set a WCAG budget. Allow 5 errors. If your code adds a 6th, the build fails. Prevent regressions and avoid tech debt accumulation.

AI handoff

Copy findings to ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or Perplexity. Ask for fix suggestions straight from the report. No context loss, no retyping.

In your workflow

Example: CI/CD integration & API response

Here’s how to integrate WCAGHub into your GitHub Actions pipeline and parse the JSON response in your own tooling.

1

GitHub Actions workflow

Scan your staging environment on every push to main. Fail the build if critical violations are found.

- name: Run WCAGHub scan
  uses: wcaghub/action@v1
  with:
    url: https://staging.example.com
    wcag-level: AA
    fail-on: error
    api-key: ${{ secrets.WCAGHUB_API_KEY }}

- name: Report results
  if: failure()
  run: |
    echo "WCAG violations found. Check the scan report."
    exit 1
2

Typical API response (JSON)

Parse this structure to customize your reporting, integrate with your dashboard, or feed into your own a11y tracking system.

{
  "id": "scan_xyz123",
  "url": "https://staging.example.com",
  "timestamp": "2026-04-16T14:32:00Z",
  "wcag_score": 72,
  "wcag_level": "AA",
  "status": "violations_found",
  "summary": {
    "critical": 4,
    "major": 12,
    "minor": 28,
    "total": 44
  },
  "issues": [
    {
      "id": "contrast_001",
      "type": "contrast",
      "severity": "critical",
      "wcag_criteria": ["WCAG 2.2 Level AA"],
      "elements_affected": 3,
      "description": "Text color does not meet 4.5:1 contrast...",
      "selector": "button.primary",
      "fix_hint": "Increase button color saturation..."
    }
  ]
}
Technical coverage

77 automated checks. WCAG 2.2 A & AA.

Web Checker handles your sites. PDF Checker covers generated reports. Document Checker processes Word/Excel/PowerPoint. All in one platform, one API, one data model.

Web Checker (77 checks)

HTML structure, images, color contrast, keyboard nav, ARIA, form labels, heading hierarchy. Covers 89% of real-world violations.

PDF Checker (161 checks)

PDF/UA compliance, VeraPDF validation, tags, fonts, metadata. Catches issues that HTML audits miss in generated PDFs.

Document Checker

Word, Excel, PowerPoint accessibility. Useful for exported reports, templates, and internal documentation.

Staged & authenticated scans

Scan localhost, private staging, or behind authentication. No need to deploy to prod to audit. Test before shipping.

Developer workflow

AI handoff: from scan to fix suggestion in seconds

Copy your WCAGHub findings, paste them into ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or Perplexity. Ask “how do I fix this?” Get code suggestions instantly. No context loss, no manual transcription.

1

Get findings from WCAGHub

Run a scan (or check your CI/CD results). See your violations listed with WCAG criteria, selectors, and fix hints.

2

Copy findings to LLM

Select findings, hit “Copy to ChatGPT”. Pre-formatted prompt includes context: the violation, the element, and what WCAG says.

3

Get fix suggestions

Ask Claude: “Fix this contrast issue in React.” Get back component code, ARIA attributes, and testing suggestions. Paste into your PR.

Technical questions

How developers use WCAGHub

Is there a REST API?
Yes. Full REST API with JSON payloads. POST a URL, get back structured violations with severity, WCAG criteria, and remediation hints. Available for engineering plans. See API docs for authentication and rate limits.
Can I run this locally or in Docker?
WCAGHub runs as a cloud service, but you can scan localhost and staging environments via our API. Docker integration is available for orchestrating multi-environment scans. Contact sales for enterprise deployment options.
How do I integrate with my CI/CD pipeline?
GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, and CircleCI templates are included. Configure your API key, set your WCAG budget and URL, and the action runs on every commit. Fails the build if violations exceed your threshold. Custom integrations via webhook are also supported.
What’s the difference vs axe-core or pa11y?
axe-core and pa11y are great for client-side JS testing. WCAGHub is broader: 77 web checks (covering server-side rendering, PDFs, and Documents), native PDF/UA validation (161 checks), and structured API responses you can integrate into CI/CD. We also cover more WCAG 2.2 AA criteria out of the box.
Does it catch PDF/UA issues too?
Yes. Our PDF Checker runs 161 checks including VeraPDF validation for PDF/UA. If you generate PDFs (invoices, reports, exports), you need this. Web Checker alone won’t catch PDF accessibility issues.
Can it scan behind authentication (staging envs)?
Yes. Pass authentication tokens, cookies, or basic auth in the API request. Scan your entire staging environment, including protected routes and admin dashboards. No need to deploy to prod to audit.
Rate limits?
Free tier: 1 scan/day. Engineering plans: 100+ scans/day depending on your tier. CI/CD workflows run scans on every push, so we’ve built burst capacity. Contact us if you need higher limits.
Ready to integrate?

Accessibility in your dev loop, not in QA

Start free. Get API docs. Integrate into your staging environment. Run a scan. See what accessibility debt looks like, then build it into your workflow.

Start free dev trial See API docs