Accessibility for Neurodivergent Users: Why Your Fancy Animations Might Be Making People Quit Your Site

With very few exceptions, it is almost impossible to argue with the recognition that your website is the beating heart of your brand. As our world continues to spiral rapidly into the vortex of online commerce, your website is critical to capturing, keeping, and converting consumer attention.

In fact, your website is so critical, that even with a well-played social media strategy and a brilliantly executed SEO strategy funneling traffic to your website, if the website itself isn’t up to snuff, there’s almost no point. 

Because when people land on your website, they have to want to stay. They have to want to explore. They have to want to buy, spend, order, enter data, or make a phone call because you’ve given them everything they need to drive conversions.  

Up until recently, the solution to this ever-present problem has been increasingly slick design frameworks. Websites that are eye-catching, attention-grabbing, and sleek AF, are considered the ultimate prize in web design. 

But what if we tell you that creating a web experience that overwhelms the senses is actually working against you? After all, if meeting consumer needs doesn’t include accessibility needs, your approach may actually be limiting you in ways you don’t even recognize.

How Hyper-Sleek Web Design Drives Away Users

Sleek design may capture a certain segment of the consumer public, but its flashing carousels, endless motion, unclear meanings, and overwhelming layouts doesn’t just annoy neurodivergent users, it actively shuts them out. 

Current estimates show that neurodivergent people in the U.S. are 20% of the population.   

“Twenty percent of the U.S. population is neurodivergent, which includes those diagnosed as having attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism, dyslexia, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), Tourette syndrome and more.”

                                              – Care Oregon, U.S.-based healthcare nonprofit

You may have thought the impact of driving away neurodivergent users was minimal or completely harmless to your business strategy, but at 20%, the impact is real and absolutely worth your time and attention.

In fact, if you haven’t considered and accounted for digital accessibility across the board in building out your UX design features, you may also be driving away the 12% of the U.S. population that is blind and low-vision. 

Even assuming there is some overlap among the neurodivergent and low-vision populations, the totals are staggering. By not elevating digital accessibility as an online priority, not accounting for it in your strategy, and not building it into your framework, you could be losing out on as much as 32% of the consumer base straight out of the gate. 

These stats aren’t meant to be shocking (though they are!); They’re meant to drive action. 

Common Accessibility Issues Impacting Neurodivergent Users

• Fast or persistent animations: Constantly moving elements, rapid movements, or hover effects can easily distract and overwhelm users.
• Overly complex navigation: Overcomplicated navigation with dozens of menu levels and interactive elements like sliders, drag and drop features, or mult-step forms can require too much hyperattention and cognitive engagement.
• Over simplistic icons or symbolic meanings: Hidden menus and abstract icons that rely on interpretation can prevent users from navigating or accessing information. Many neurodivergent users require straight-forward, direct instructions and meaning in order to understand intent and directions. 
• Auto-play media: Visual and audio media that plays automatically or can’t easily and quickly be stopped, can result in sensory overload.
• Lack of structure or Feedback: Walls of text with no structure or forms that don’t clearly show errors, next steps, or guidance, can leave neurodivergent users at a loss.
• Overwhelming design: Designs that ignore cognitive load (too many steps, too much info at once) can quickly cause neurodivergent users to shut down or disengage. 

5 Ways Build a Website Optimized for Neurodivergent Users

There are a number of things you can do to ensure that your website is designed and built with all users in mind, including neurodivergent users. Among the ones specifically geared to improving the experience for users with ADHD, autism, dyslexia, and more, are these five:

1. Be Clear, Direct, and Consistent: have menus you want users to navigate and directions you want them to follow? Say it as clearly and directly as possible. Avoid things like hamburger icons and just explicitly label your menu exactly what it is.Examples: Home, About Us, Services, Pricing, Contact Us, FAQs, Shopping Cart, etc. 
2. Use Easily Readable Text: Opt for a combination of fonts and backgrounds that make text stand out, and make it clearly and easily readable. Be especially careful with font choice, because some fonts are much harder for people with dyslexia to read. Sans-serif is generally considered a better font choice for optimizing readability. Also, avoid justified text when possible. 
3. Avoid Sensory Overload: If your site makes a neurodivergent person feel like they’re in a pinball machine, that’s not innovation—it’s exclusion. Too much of everything all at once might seem like a good idea, but it is unlikely to invite prolonged engagement for most people, especially those who are particularly sensitive to visual and auditory stimulation. 
4. Assist with Focus and Task Completion: Rather than trying to rush the process and throw rapid-fire tasks at visitors, shift the focus to clear directions, easily understood error messages, and small tasks broken into distinct steps, if possible. 
5. Stop Pressuring People for No Reason: High-pressure tactics might work for a certain percentage of the population, but we’re willing to bet that an excessive emphasis on  time-limited interactions is actually working against you. Even the most dedicated consumers from the blind and low-vision community and the neurodivergent community can be quickly iced out by a website that unnecessarily forces high pressure, time-sensitive decision making and interactions. Chill out. Make the experience so good that you don’t have to rush people for no reason because they love the experience they’re having and the choice they get to make.

How to Understand What Your Website Brings to the Table

When building your website from scratch, you have the very real advantage of building smart, innovative accessibility right into your interface from the start.

When your website already exists, already has a full throttle marketing campaign sending it traffic, and already has a loyal consumer base, you would never even dream of starting from scratch again. In fact, even suggesting that approach is completely bonkers. 

But what you would do, what you can do, and what you should do, is get a professional accessibility audit of your website. The right audit makes it easy to tweak, adjust, and reimagine your website from an accessibility perspective, opening you to new customers, increased loyalty, greater brand reach, impressive tax breaks, and SEO ranking boosts. 

At AllyADA, our audits include feedback from real users—including those who are neurodivergent—so your team can clearly see where your design might be leading to overwhelm instead of engagement.

We don’t just believe that everyone deserves equitable access to the experiences that shape our consumer economy. We also know that giving more people access to your website grows your business, your bottom-line, and your bank account, too. 

Call today for a free consultation and to learn more!