What ADA complaints say is broken on online stores

Start from the complaint

Most advice about ADA lawsuits starts from WCAG and works forward. We wanted to start from the other end, with what plaintiffs say went wrong. So we read 48 federal complaints against online stores, filed from 2023 to 2026 by 13 different law firms, all of them free to read in the RECAP archive.^* 31 of the 48 stores were running on Shopify when we checked their home pages this month.^*

A complaint is an allegation. No court has ruled on these barriers, and firms reuse their text from one filing to the next. Demand letters, which settle long before anything is filed, are mostly invisible, but they come from the same firms and likely work from the same lists. Read together, the complaints show what those firms look for.

A blind shopper trying to buy something

The plaintiffs in these cases are blind shoppers who use screen readers. Each complaint walks through an attempt to buy something, and the barriers come up in the order a shopper meets them. The product page is named in 33 of the 48, the menus and collections in 28, adding to cart in 20, checkout in 19, the cart in 15 and search in 14.^*

Here is what they name most often, counted by complaint, with the number of firms that named it:^*

• Links with no name, or a name that doesn't say where they go: 33 complaints, 10 firms. Icon links, a cart link read aloud as "3", the same product linked twice in a row.
• Images with no description, or one that says nothing useful: 32 complaints, 10 firms.
• Menus, swatches and checkboxes that don't say whether they're open, selected or checked: 25 complaints, 10 firms.
• Focus left behind when a cart drawer, quick view or dialog opens, so the screen reader keeps reading the page underneath: 25 complaints, 9 firms.
• Discount and newsletter pop-ups that cover the page without being announced, or can't be closed: 24 complaints, 10 firms.
• Controls the keyboard can't reach, such as menus, filters and search suggestions: 23 complaints, 9 firms.
• Buttons with no name, such as quantity plus and minus, close and search: 21 complaints, 10 firms.
• Changes that go unannounced, like "added to cart", a new quantity or a list of search results: 16 complaints, 8 firms.

Read as a story, it's one shopper. She opens the menu and can't tell whether it opened. She picks a size and can't tell which one is selected. She presses add to cart, hears silence, and presses it again. The cart drawer slides open while her screen reader is still on the product page.

Contrast barely comes up

Low contrast text is the most common failure automated tools find. WebAIM's scan of the top million home pages found it on 83.9% of them this year.^* In our 48 complaints it came up zero times. Focus you can't see came up once.^*

That doesn't make contrast optional. Shoppers with low vision need it, and WCAG requires it. It does mean that a store that has fixed its colors and stopped there has fixed the wrong half for these plaintiffs. What they describe is what a screen reader and a keyboard run into.

What a scan sees and what a shopper hears

Three of the 48 complaints cite an automated tool. Seven more cite an expert who went through the site by hand.^* The barrier lists come from someone using the store.

Several of the most named barriers pass the usual automated checks. A button that opens a menu passes without saying it's expanded. A swatch with no selected state passes. Two links side by side to the same product pass. A cart link that a screen reader reads as "3" passes. A store can score well in a scanner and still have most of the list above. You find these by using the store, with the keyboard and a screen reader, the way the plaintiff did.

Some of it is template

Firms file from templates. One New York firm's seven complaints carry the same five items, word for word, with only the store's name changed. The five are missing alt text, empty links, redundant links, linked images with no text, and duplicate page titles.^* A guide for defendants from Level Access warns that letters can cite automated findings that aren't barriers, and issues that live in someone else's code.^*

Some of it does live in someone else's code. Four complaints say a screen reader reaches the discount code field only after the Pay Now button.^* On a Shopify store that order belongs to Shopify's checkout, which a theme can't change outside Shopify Plus. If a letter names it, write down where it lives. That's part of a good-faith record.

Test the path they took

The useful lesson from these complaints is where to look. Put the mouse away, turn on the screen reader your computer already has, and buy something. Open the menu. Choose a size. Press add to cart and listen. Open the cart and check where you land. Close the pop-up. Type into search. The checklist covers each step, and the shoppers who leave are hitting the same walls.

SiteRemora's scan now walks part of this path on a product page from each template, choosing an option, adding to cart and typing into search, and fixes what a screen reader can't hear in your theme.

Every one of the 48 complaints began with someone who wanted to buy something and couldn't finish. Start your testing where they started.