Day 160

Turn on larger accessibility text sizes

25 Oct 2022

Reminder to enable Larger Accessibility Sizes, so you can pick from one of the five extra accessibility sizes when configuring text sizes. You can do it from Settings, Accessibility, Display & Text Size, and Larger Text.

You can enable 5 extra accessibility text sizes, called Large Accessibility Sizes, by going to Settings, Accessibility, Display & Text size, and Larger Text. There are drawings of that screen. It shows how when toggling the Large Accessibility Size on, it allows you to pick up from 5 sizes and it compares how the screen looks when the larger text size is selected when this option is on, and off.

Some of you have asked me how you can support what I do. This would really help, and would be hugely appreciated:

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You may also find interesting...

Sometimes, with large font sizes, there's no other way around it but to offer an alternative layout. Small tweaks are often enough. Otherwise, the text will be barely readable. Larger text shouldn't mean less content or a worse experience. One thing you can do is to check if the preferred content size category of a view is an accessibility category. And, in that case, move things around to make room for the text, offer more lines of text, etc. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uicontentsizecategory/isaccessibilitycategory

I recommend running your app with Double-length Pseudolanguage. It is a great way to stress-testing your app and see how adaptive it is and if your UI will hold to other languages that might be a bit more verbose or even with larger text sizes.

Assistive Touch for the Apple Watch works like magic. It lets you use your watch with gestures with the hand of the same arm you are wearing your watch on. No need to use your nose! If you don't have it on, is because you don't know about it.


Content © Daniel Devesa Derksen-Staats on Accessibility up to 11! is licensed under CC BY 4.0. License details