简体中文
EnglishWhat Is Disability Simulator?
Updated
Disability Simulator (disabilitysimulator.com) is an interactive website that lets you experience web accessibility challenges firsthand. It offers browser-based simulations for visual, motor, and cognitive impairments, so you can see how people with disabilities navigate the web and where barriers appear. It is aimed at anyone who builds, reviews, or uses websites and wants a practical feel for accessibility issues rather than an abstract checklist.
What the site offers
The site organizes its content around three available simulation categories, with more listed as coming soon.
Available Simulations
| Category | Simulations | What they demonstrate |
|---|---|---|
| Visual Impairments | Blindness (screen reader navigation), Low Vision (blurred and limited vision), Color Blindness (color perception differences) | How content is experienced without sight, with reduced vision, or with altered color perception |
| Motor Impairments | Keyboard Only (navigation without a mouse), Limited Control (tremor and precision challenges) | How people who cannot use a mouse or who have limited fine motor control interact with interfaces |
| Cognitive Impairments | Dyslexia (reading and text processing), ADHD (attention and focus challenges) | How reading difficulties and attention issues affect comprehension and task completion |
Coming Soon
The site lists several additional categories as planned:
- Hearing Impairments — deaf and hard of hearing experiences
- Seizure Disorders — photosensitive epilepsy triggers
- Autism Spectrum — sensory processing differences
- Memory Impairments — short-term memory challenges
- Aging-Related — age-related accessibility needs
- Multiple Disabilities — combined accessibility challenges
Why the site frames accessibility this way
The homepage leads with the heading "See through disabled people eyes" and presents three statistics to set context:
- 1.3B people with disabilities
- 98% of websites with barriers
- $13T in annual disposable income
The intent is to connect a human experience (what it feels like to hit a barrier) with scale (how many people are affected) and economic weight (the market represented). The simulations are the mechanism: instead of reading about a guideline, you attempt a task under a constraint and notice where the interface fails you.
How to use it
- Open disabilitysimulator.com in a browser.
- Pick a simulation from the Available Simulations list — for example, Keyboard Only under Motor Impairments or Screen reader navigation under Visual Impairments.
- Attempt a normal web task under that constraint (navigating, reading, or completing a form).
- Note where you get stuck. Those sticking points are the accessibility barriers the simulation is designed to surface.
The site does not publish pricing or login details in the available material, so treat access terms as unconfirmed rather than assuming it is free or requires no account.
Who it is for
- Designers and developers who want to test assumptions about keyboard navigation, contrast, and text readability.
- Content and product teams who need a shared reference point when discussing accessibility priorities.
- Educators and trainers looking for a hands-on way to introduce why accessibility matters.
If you only need a definition of accessibility, a guideline document is faster. If you want to feel where your own site breaks, a simulation is the more useful starting point.