Checking accessibility with a screen reader

Screen readers have many keyboard commands for navigating, reading and interacting with content. It isn't necessary to know them all, but learning a few basic screen reader commands for the purposes of testing is a good idea.

Screen reader commands

This page covers Narrator for Windows 10 because it's available on official Scottish Government laptops. JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver are other screen readers. They all have different ways to use them.

Turning Narrator on and off

You turn on Narrator by pressing the Windows, Control, and Enter keys. You use the same keys to turn it off again. If you're using an older version of Windows 10, use Windows and Enter to turn Narrator on and off.

Narrator Home

Every time you turn on Narrator, Narrator Home is displayed. You can get to the Narrator user manual, QuickStart, and the Narrator settings from there.

Quick start

If you haven't used Narrator before, choose Quick Start from Narrator Home. It's a tutorial that will teach you the basics of using Narrator. It includes a web page where you can practice things like navigating and reading content.

Narrator key

Narrator uses either the Caps Lock or Insert key to modify the behaviour of other keys. This is known as the Narrator key.

Stop Narrator talking

You stop Narrator from talking by pressing the Control key.

Browsers

Narrator works with Edge and Chrome. Edge is the recommended browser to use with Narrator.

Web page summary

You can get a summary of a web page by pressing Narrator and S. Narrator will tell you how many links, landmarks, and headings there are on the page. These are the most common ways a screen reader user will navigate through content.

You can get a more detailed summary by pressing Narrator and S twice quickly.

Scan Mode

Scan Mode is turned on automatically. You can toggle it on or off by pressing Narrator + Space. If you turn Scan Mode off, Narrator will remember that next time you open Edge.

When Scan Mode is on, use the up or down keys to navigate content. Press the Enter or Space keys to activate things like links, buttons, or a text box.

Scan Mode commands

Narrator has lots of commands. You can use the commands in this table for testing web pages.

Press these keys:	To do this action:	And check for the following:
H	Move to the next heading	the heading should tell you what's in that section of content the headings should form a hierarchy that represents the different sections of content
D	Move to the next landmark	the page should include landmarks for major areas of the page, like navigation blocks, the main content area, and search
F	Move to the next form field	the type of form field should be announced, like checkbox, radio button, or edit field the visible label for the form field should be announced automatically the state of the form field should be announced, like if a checkbox is checked or not, or if a toggle button is pressed or not
B	Moves to the next button	everything that looks like a button should be reachable with this command the visible label or icon for the button should be announced, and make sense the button should carry out its intended action when activated
K (or tab)	Moves to the next link	everything that looks like a link should be reachable with this command the link text must be announced, and make sense the link must carry out its intended action when activated
T	Moves to the next table	the table caption should be announced the number of rows and columns in the table should be announced
Control and alt and left or right	Moves left or right across a table row	the column header should be announced as each cell in the row is navigated to
Control and alt and up ordown	Moves up or down through the table column	the row header should be announced as each cell in the column is navigated to

Complete Narrator guide

Microsoft has a complete Narrator guide, with lots more information about Narrator and how to use it.