Liability
ADA Title III digital-accessibility lawsuits filed against U.S. private-sector defendants in 2025 — federal courts plus New York and California state courts.
Of the federal cases, 45% were filed against defendants with a prior ADA digital-accessibility lawsuit. The lawsuits are not slowing down. The repeat-target rate is going up.
usablenet · 2025 year-end ada digital lawsuit report · federal + ny/ca state courts
five findings · verbatim quotes · primary sources
U.S. Department of Justice → UC Berkeley · 2016
“Many PDFs either did not have a tag structure defined or the tag structure was incorrect. Individuals with vision disabilities who use screen readers would have a difficult time understanding and navigating.”
DOJ Civil Rights Division · Aug 30, 2016
U.S. Department of Education → Michigan Department of Education · 2015
“Authors must also include tags in the pdf documents. Tags indicate the document structure. Tags identify the type of content (e.g. figure, heading, paragraph, or list) and the correct reading order of content on the page.”
OCR Docket #15-14-1110 · Jun 22, 2015
National Federation of the Blind v. Scribd → Scribd, Inc. · 2015
“Scribd shall not accept from publishers nor permit the uploading of any untagged or image PDF files from publishers to the Scribd library.”
D. Vt. Case No. 2:14-CV-162 · Nov 10, 2015
U.S. Department of Justice + Aleeha Dudley → Miami University (Ohio) · 2016
“Methods of making accessible PDFs, word processing documents, and presentations, and methods of remediating inaccessible PDFs, word processing documents, and presentations, including the addition or remediation of headings, alternative text, and accessibility of material provided in links and multimedia.”
S.D. Ohio Case No. 1:14-cv-00038 · Oct 17, 2016
U.S. Access Board → all federal authoring tools · 2018
“Authoring tools capable of exporting PDF files that conform to ISO 32000-1:2008 (PDF 1.7) shall also be capable of exporting PDF files that conform to ANSI/AIIM/ISO 14289-1:2016 (PDF/UA-1).”
Revised 508 Standards · effective Jan 18, 2018
Settlements
NFB v. Target Corp. · 2008
Class settlement, California damages class. The first major U.S. digital-accessibility class action.
United States v. Greyhound Lines · 2016
Final disbursements to ~2,100 individuals under DOJ consent decree (Title III).
United States v. Carnival Corp. · 2015
Civil penalty + passenger compensation. WCAG 2.0 AA mandate for cruise-line websites within 18 months.
DOT v. Scandinavian Airlines · 2018
ACAA civil penalty for non-conforming airline website. The leading DOT digital-accessibility enforcement action.
DOJ + NFB v. H&R Block · 2014
WCAG 2.0 AA consent decree. The federal Title III digital-accessibility benchmark every law firm cites.
Dudley v. Miami University · 2016
Consent-decree compensation. The cash is small. The multi-year obligations — accessibility coordinator, procurement rewrite, per-semester student meetings — are the real cost.
Per violation
These are not caps. They are minimums per offense. Multiple plaintiffs, multiple documents, multiple visits — they all multiply.
California Unruh Civil Rights Act
Cal. Civ. Code § 52
Per-offense statutory damages floor. ADA violations are per se Unruh violations under § 51(f). Stacks with ADA. Drives the volume of California digital-accessibility filings.
Colorado HB21-1110
C.R.S. § 24-34-802
Statutory fine per violation, payable to each plaintiff. State and local government PDFs are squarely in scope as of July 2024.
Accessible Canada Act
S.C. 2019, c. 10 § 91(2)
Maximum administrative monetary penalty per violation under the federal Canadian regime. Federally regulated entities — banks, telecoms, transport, broadcasting.
Volume
usablenet · 2025 year-end report
usablenet · 2025 year-end report
usablenet · 2025 year-end report
webaim · 2025 million page accessibility report
UsableNet's count covers ADA Title III filings — lawsuits against private-sector defendants under the public-accommodation regime. State and local government compliance runs on a separate track: Title II DOJ enforcement and the deadlines set by the April 2024 Title II final rule, covered below.
Title III has no DOJ-promulgated technical accessibility standard. Courts and the DOJ have variously cited WCAG 2.0 and 2.1 AA in consent decrees; the April 2024 Title II rule — which formally adopted WCAG 2.1 AA for state and local government web content and mobile apps — is increasingly cited as the de facto Title III benchmark too. WCAG 2.2 AA is the standard legal counsel currently recommends. Private plaintiffs — not DOJ enforcement — drive the operative Title III litigation pressure.
The April 2024 Title II rule sets WCAG 2.1 AA as mandatory for state and local government websites and mobile apps; the April 2026 IFR extended the compliance dates below. Five narrow exceptions apply (archived content, preexisting non-operational documents, third-party posts, individualized password-protected files, preexisting social media). Operational documents — current forms, applications, code and regulation PDFs — are in scope regardless of upload date. Conforming "accessible alternate versions" are allowed only in very limited circumstances. Read the DOJ fact sheet →
The overlay-widget figure is the strongest single number on this page. 1,416 of 2025's lawsuits — and 112 in April 2026 alone (23% of that month's filings) — were filed against defendants already running a third-party accessibility overlay. The ratio has been stable since 2024 (approximately 1 in 4 per legal commentary). Overlays do not resolve code-level structural issues; plaintiffs target them anyway.
Geographic spread is national, and state-court filings increasingly outpace federal — state laws (NY Human Rights, CA Unruh) permit damages while the ADA itself permits only injunctive relief. New York and Florida lead; California declined in 2025; Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and Missouri added meaningful volume.
four active rules · eu + u.s. federal
European Accessibility Act
since June 28, 2025
EU-wide. Banking, e-commerce, e-books, transport ticketing, and more. Member-State penalties — Germany up to €100,000 per violation.
DOJ Title II Final Rule
state and local government, ≥ 50,000 population
WCAG 2.1 AA mandatory for websites and mobile apps. Every U.S. state and local government entity, courts and special districts included.
DOJ Title II Final Rule
state and local government, < 50,000 population
WCAG 2.1 AA mandatory for websites and mobile apps. Smaller jurisdictions and special-purpose districts.
HHS Section 504 Final Rule
tiered schedule begins May 2026 for the largest recipients
WCAG 2.1 AA for websites, mobile apps, and self-service kiosks. Any healthcare entity receiving HHS federal financial assistance. Compliance dates are tiered by entity size; verify the current applicable date in the federal register before relying on a specific timeline.
The only thing that beats a regulatory deadline is starting before it.
TrueSection remediates entire PDF corpora end-to-end and proves the result with veraPDF — both the WCAG 2.2 (full) and PDF/UA-1 standards, on every document, before it ships. The validation report is the receipt.
Request an invite →none of the figures on this page are interpretive. every claim links to a primary source — federal register, doj archive, court filings, statute text. you can verify before you cite.