Accessibility Statement

Ask Aunt Starling is built by Ask Auntie LLC, and we want it to be usable and welcoming to everyone, including people who use assistive technology such as screen readers, keyboard-only navigation, screen magnifiers, or browser settings that enlarge text or reduce motion. Accessibility is something we keep working on, page by page, as the site grows.

The standard we aim for

We aim to meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, Level AA. These are the internationally recognized guidelines for making websites accessible, and they are the benchmark generally used to measure compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and similar laws.

Current status: partially conformant. "Partially conformant" means most of the site meets the standard, but some parts do not yet fully meet it. We are honest about that, and the known gaps are listed below.

What we have done

• Semantic, well-labeled HTML with appropriate ARIA roles and labels on interactive controls (menus, forms, the location search).
• Controls you can reach and use from the keyboard, with a visible focus outline. In September 2026 we pressed Tab through fifteen main pages in a real browser, at phone and desktop sizes and with the cookie notice showing, and checked every stop: that focus is visible, that nothing pinned to the screen covers it, that it never gets stuck, and that the order follows the page. We fixed what we found: chart shapes with no visible focus, and controls that scrolled underneath the cookie notice or the Report an Issue button.
• An automated WCAG 2.2 AA scan of every main page, run in a real browser as a signed-in reader. The first full run, in September 2026, found three problems (text contrast on one page, and two labelling faults); all three are fixed and re-checked.
• Respect for your device's "Reduce Motion" setting, if you turn it on, we switch off animations and movement across the site.
• An opt-in Calm mode (the toggle at the bottom of every page) that flattens textured backgrounds, mutes bright accents, turns off motion, and adds breathing room, a quieter, lower-stimulation version of the site. Your choice is remembered on your device.
• Short help videos that are silent, so nothing plays sound at you, and never start on their own. Every one of them has its words written out in order on the same page, directly underneath, so you never have to watch a video to find out what it said.
• Text that scales with your browser's font-size setting, without breaking the layout.
• A site-wide glossary: tap or hover any underlined astrology term for a plain definition.
• Automated accessibility testing (axe-core) as part of an ongoing page-by-page review. Automated tools find roughly a third to a half of accessibility problems, so we treat a clean scan as a starting point, not a certificate.

Designing for different minds

Beyond the formal guidelines, we try to make the site comfortable for autistic and neurodivergent visitors, and for anyone who finds busy or figurative content hard to process. That means honoring reduced-motion preferences, avoiding autoplay and surprise changes, telling you in advance when a link opens in a new tab, breaking readings into clear sections, and explaining astrology terms plainly. This is ongoing work, and the items below name what is still in progress.

Known limitations

We are actively working on these:

• The natal chart wheel is a detailed graphic. It carries a full written description of the chart for screen readers, and each pattern you can draw on it is a button whose name says which planets it joins. We have checked what the wheel presents to a screen reader (its name, its description and its buttons, with the drawing's loose labels hidden), but not yet listened to it with a screen reader in hand.
• The keyboard check above was driven by the Tab key in a browser rather than by a person; we still want a person to try the main tasks with only a keyboard.
• An optional plain-language summary alongside the more lyrical readings is planned.
• A full screen-reader review of every page is in progress; some pages have been checked more thoroughly than others.

How we test

We self-assess using automated tools: axe-core for the WCAG 2.2 A/AA checks, run in a real browser against the live site, and a measurement of the text size every page actually renders at, at phone, tablet and desktop widths. We also drive each main page with the Tab key and check every focus stop, and read what the page presents to a screen reader. Listening with a real screen reader, and a person's keyboard-only walkthrough, are the parts still in progress.

Tell us about a barrier

If you run into something on Ask Aunt Starling that is hard to use, or you need information in a different format, please tell us, your feedback genuinely helps. Email askauntstarling@gmail.com and we will do our best to respond promptly and to help you get what you need.

Compatibility

The site is built with standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and is designed to work with current versions of major browsers (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge) and their built-in assistive technologies. Older browsers may not support every feature.