How to make the leap to paid accessibility tools when you need to accelerate progress
As developers, we like free tools. We use them all the time. And when we go into a new project, one of the first things we often do is evaluate whether our existing free tools are up to the task. Sometimes they are. But when they’re not, that’s what you’ve got to look at paid and premium tools.
In the realm of accessibility, this happens all the time. You encounter challenges, and you realize you need more advanced testing coverage, greater stability, better overall functionality, and an improved way to uncover accessibility violations.
Easier said than done, right? The reality is, making the leap from free to paid can be tricky, and you’ll likely be asking yourself:
- What more would I get from paid tools that free tools don’t provide?
- Will paid tooling actually help my product be more accessible?
- How do I justify the budget for this?
These are all questions I’ve had to deal with, and I’m going to walk through each of them with you in this post.
We’ll consider both the quantitative and qualitative aspects of each—what these accessibility tools actually do, how they lend themselves to making applications more accessible, and how you can show management that using tools like these makes things better for the team and the organization.
If you’re already prepared to make the leap, please request a demo of our tools today.
What’s actually out there?
If you’ve been developing applications with accessibility in mind, you’ve likely heard of axe-core. Developed by Deque and then released open-source, it’s the leading accessibility testing engine for websites and user interfaces, capable of catching around 57% of common WCAG violations (with no false positives!) That’s a solid foundation, but when you’re building production-ready software, you need more than that baseline. Open-source tools can only identify some accessibility issues, and they lack team-wide policies and safeguards. They cannot set standards across teams, easily integrate into CI/CD processes, automatically stop inaccessible code, or keep track of issues. This is where paid tools come in, expanding on what you get from axe-core but with broader coverage and more advanced capabilities.
What are the different tools?
When determining what tools are required, we typically discuss a few different checkpoints: which tools work while we’re writing code and when we’re testing locally in the browser, and which tools integrate into our version control system. From an accessibility perspective, all these checkpoints are covered with the axe DevTools for Web suite of tools. From the time I write code, I can see instant feedback with the axe DevTools Linter, which will statically analyze the code as I write it. It’ll return common accessibility violations such as missing alternative text for images or improper ARIA roles.
Since I like to keep another screen open while I work, I can run my project with LocalHost and catch the rendered webpage issues via the axe DevTools Extension. Because the browser is rendering the code I’ve written, via the Document Object Model (DOM), it’ll pick up other areas, such as insufficient color contrast, once the page renders.
As I’ve been practicing my test-driven development skills, I’ve been able to plug axe Watcher into some Cypress tests and see the results in the axe Developer Hub. It’ll watch my tests fire, and will take a look at my project as it’s being built, without manually telling it to check each step. I can plug a few lines of code into my testing suite, and it’ll automatically invoke itself when my normal tests run.
What else can these tools do?
The axe DevTools for Web suite provides you with the APIs, GitHub integrations, and pre-commit hooks necessary to catch issues early and enforce accessibility standards throughout your software development lifecycle (SDLC).
The axe DevTools Extension also includes Intelligent Guided Tests (IGTs). These are interactive test flows that require minimal effort—typically a few ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions—that help you catch complex accessibility issues that automation can’t reliably detect, such as keyboard traps, form labeling problems, or incorrect modal behavior.
I mentioned axe Developer Hub can plug into your testing suite, but you can also plug that accessibility testing into your existing CI systems (like GitHub Actions, GitLab, or Bitbucket) using a REST API. I can also run axe DevTools Linter to bring similar coverage even earlier in my pipeline. It can run directly in a GitHub pull request or even a pre-commit hook, to flag accessibility violations inline in the code, just like a traditional linter.
What do these tools make possible?
With the proper tooling in place, accessibility stops being a series of disconnected spot-checks and starts becoming something that I can weave into my entire development process, as well as one that I can share with other developers on my team. We can then validate accessibility as we code, continue checking it in the browser, and know that the same validations can carry through our automated tests once everything is set up in our CI pipelines. That means I can not only trust my app on static pages but also on dynamic states and user flows. It also makes better collaboration possible since issues don’t remain solely on my machine. They’re fully visible, shareable, and can be tied back to code commits that an entire team can act on. Here’s an example report showing just one example from the axe DevTools Extension.
What positive outcomes can I expect if I use these tools?
I’d say that the biggest outcome is that accessibility becomes consistent. Instead of racing to fix issues post-production or after a release, I can catch issues earlier when fixes are cheaper and less disruptive. That translates into faster delivery, fewer production incidents, and less rework eating up sprint time. This consistency will show up in trend lines: teams can measure improvement, prove their compliance, and demonstrate measurable progress to their leadership. By making accessibility a normal, reliable part of how products get built, we can put out quality products that are functionally usable by more people.
Will these tools actually help, and how do I get budget for them?
From a quantitative standpoint, the answer is yes. Paid tools improve accuracy by going beyond surface-level scans and catching accessibility issues in dynamic states and user flows. These are things that free tooling consistently misses. Paid tools also improve speed when we introduce checks that run automatically in the editor, browser, and pipeline, via artificial intelligence and automation, reducing the heavy lifting that would otherwise fall to manual testers.
Qualitatively, the gains are just as impactful. Accessibility becomes easier to collaborate on—results are visible across teams, can be tied to code commits, and can be exported or pushed directly into issue trackers like Jira. This, in turn, drives efficiency, since fixes happen in the flow of development rather than after production.
And this is exactly where the budget conversation comes in. The ROI is straightforward: Every issue caught earlier means hours of rework avoided, features shipped faster, and production incidents prevented. Multiply that across the codebase, and the ROI is far higher than the cost of the tool. Paid tools help teams save money and time by shifting defect capture from QA to development, where fixes are cheaper. They increase efficiency and collaboration by centralizing visibility and standardizing results. Most importantly, they help us create better products that are usable by more people while reducing the risk of accessibility gaps leading to legal exposure or customer frustration.
What’s next?
We’ve seen what happens when free tools hit their limits and no longer keep pace with the demands of real projects. We’ve walked through the premium tools available, how they fit into a developer’s workflow, what they make possible, and the outcomes they unlock. We’ve also considered the ROI; how these tools save time, reduce rework, improve collaboration, and ultimately help us ship better products for more people.
At this point, the next step is simple: choose the tools that fit your team, make your case for them, and then get back to doing the work that matters, namely, building software that’s accessible to everyone.
Request a demo today to see how these tools work in your environments!
