WCAG 2.2 AA Checklist: What Actually Changed from 2.1

If your last audit was against WCAG 2.1, you're not fully compliant anymore. Not because your site got worse, but because the standard moved. WCAG 2.2 became the current version in October 2023, and most legal and procurement references (including the EU's European Accessibility Act) now point to it.

The good news: the gap between 2.1 and 2.2 is small. Nine new success criteria were added, one was removed, and nothing existing was changed. Here's exactly what's new at the AA level, the bar most businesses are expected to hit.

What's new at AA

2.4.11 Focus Not Obscured (Minimum)

When something is keyboard-focused, whether a button, a link, or a form field, at least part of it has to stay visible. Sticky headers, cookie banners, and chat widgets are the usual culprits: they sit on top of the page and quietly swallow whatever's focused underneath.

2.5.7 Dragging Movements

Anything that currently requires a drag gesture (reordering a list, a slider, a custom drag-and-drop uploader) needs a single-pointer alternative, like tap-to-select-then-tap-to-place, or up and down buttons. This one catches a lot of custom-built dashboards and admin tools.

2.5.8 Target Size (Minimum)

Clickable targets need to be at least 24 by 24 CSS pixels, or have enough spacing around them that a smaller target doesn't overlap its neighbours. Icon-only nav bars, tightly packed table row actions, and mobile toolbars are where this usually fails.

3.3.8 Accessible Authentication (Minimum)

Login and signup flows can't rely purely on a cognitive test (remembering a password, solving a puzzle CAPTCHA, transcribing a code from an image) without an alternative. Password managers, "email me a link," and standard CAPTCHA alternatives like reCAPTCHA v3 generally satisfy this.

What's new at Level A (still part of getting to full AA compliance)

3.2.6 Consistent Help

If you offer a help mechanism (live chat, a contact link, a help page) across multiple pages, it needs to appear in the same relative place and order each time. You can't have chat in the bottom right on one page and buried in a footer on another.

3.3.7 Redundant Entry

Don't make people re-enter information they already gave you in the same process. If someone types their email on step one of a checkout, step three shouldn't ask for it again from scratch. Autofill it, or let them confirm it.

What was removed

4.1.1 Parsing. This one required valid, well-formed HTML (no duplicate IDs, no unclosed tags). It's gone in 2.2, mainly because modern browsers and assistive tech handle malformed HTML gracefully now, and the criterion was catching technical validation issues rather than real accessibility barriers. You don't need to chase this one anymore, though clean HTML is still good practice.

What this means practically

If you were WCAG 2.1 AA compliant before, you're not starting from zero. You're checking four new AA criteria (focus visibility, dragging, target size, authentication) plus two Level A additions (consistent help, redundant entry). For most sites, the most common failures we see are target size on mobile nav and focus being obscured by sticky elements. Both are usually a CSS fix, not a rebuild.

The criteria that catch people out hardest are the ones tied to custom components: drag-and-drop interfaces, bespoke login flows, in-house sliders. Off-the-shelf frameworks tend to handle the basics already.

Getting an actual answer

Checklists tell you what to look for. They don't tell you where your site currently stands, mapped to severity and an actual fix. If you want that, send us your URL. We run a full WCAG 2.2 AA audit and send back a written report, with every finding tied to a success criterion, a severity rating, and a fix a developer can action without a call.