Lost in Translation: Tips for Multilingual Web Accessibility The article provides practical guidance for implementing multilingual web accessibility, emphasizing the importance of using the `lang` attribute to declare content language for screen readers and text-to-speech software. It explains that the primary page language should be set on the `` element, while any secondary language content must be wrapped in elements with their own `lang` attributes to ensure correct pronunciation and braille display. The author notes that specifying language is a low-effort, high-impact accessibility requirement (WCAG Level A) that is frequently overlooked. Bienvenue Internationalization and localization efforts have a lot in common with web accessibility. Both are domains of usability with the express goal of ensuring audiences are included by an interface, rather than excluded from it. Both benefit heavily from forethought and careful strategy, rather than attempts to retrofit improvements after the fact. Both are often worked on by people who are building outside of their own lived experiences. At the intersection of internationalization/ making sure that our accessibility efforts and internationalization/localization efforts alike don’t leave out disabled speakers of other languages than our own. I’ve personally found it really difficult to find practical, useful guidance for multilingual web accessibility specifically — so let’s change that Here are a few tips for multilingual web accessibility that I’ve picked up so far, largely from my experience as a developer. For these tips, I’m generally assuming you have a fair amount of control over, or input into, your site’s design, markup, styles, and scripts. Content management systems and site builders are their own cans of worms that I don’t have a lot of experience with, so I’ve opted not to cover them in this post. I’m also sure this won’t be a complete list, so please reach out on Mastodon https://a11y.info/@ben/111393018475760716 if you think of something I’ve missed Declare the Content Language The lang attribute https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Reference/Global attributes/lang is used to specify the human language of a given element. It takes an ISO-defined code for the primary language, which can then be followed by additional subtags for specifying region and other possible variations — though to maximize compatibility with clients and assistive technologies, W3C recommends keeping your language tags as broad as possible https://www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-choosing-language-tags , only using regional subtags or other variant subtags when they’re absolutely necessary to understand the content. Declaring content’s language is especially useful for screenreaders and text-to-speech software, which use the lang attribute as a cue to load the right pronunciation rules https://adrianroselli.com/2015/01/on-use-of-lang-attribute.html . lang can improve the braille display https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refreshable braille display experience, too; the JAWS screenreader uses language detection to load users’ language-specific braille profiles https://support.freedomscientific.com/downloads/jaws/JAWSWhatsNew?version=2022 BrailleProfiles , for instance. There are two main times we need to set the lang attribute: once when establishing the page’s primary language, and then again whenever elements or bits of text are set in some language other than the page’s primary language. Setting the Page’s Primary Language To set a page’s primary language, specify the lang attribute on your