github / accessibility-scanner

AI-powered Accessibility Scanner The AI-powered Accessibility Scanner (a11y scanner) is a GitHub Action that detects accessibility barriers across your digital products, creates trackable issues, and leverages GitHub Copilot for AI-powered fixes. The a11y scanner helps teams: • 🔍 Scan websites, repositories, and dynamic content for accessibility issues • 📝 Create actionable GitHub issues that can be assigned to GitHub Copilot • 🤖 Propose fixes with GitHub Copilot, with humans reviewing before merging > ⚠️ **Note:** The a11y scanner is currently in public preview. Feature development work is still ongoing. It can help identify accessibility gaps but cannot guarantee fully accessible code suggestions. Always review before merging! 🎥 **Watch the demo video** to see the a11y scanner in action. --- Frequently-Asked Questions (FAQ) Requirements To use the a11y scanner, you'll need: • **GitHub Actions** enabled in your repository • **GitHub Issues** enabled in your repository • **Available GitHub Actions minutes** for your account • **Admin access** to add repository secrets • **GitHub Copilot** (optional) - The a11y scanner works without GitHub Copilot and will still create issues for accessibility findings. However, without GitHub Copilot, you won't be able to automatically assign issues to GitHub Copilot for AI-powered fix suggestions and PR creation. Getting started • Add a workflow file Create a workflow file in (e.g., ) in your repository: > 👉 Update all placeholders with your actual values. See Action Inputs for details. **Required permissions:** • Write access to add or update workflows • Admin access to add repository secrets 📚 Learn more • Quickstart for GitHub Actions • Understanding GitHub Actions • Writing workflows • Managing GitHub Actions settings • GitHub Actions billing --- • Create a token and add a secret The a11y scanner requires a Personal Access Token (PAT) as a repository secret: **The is a fine-grained PAT with:** • • • • • • **Scope:** Your target repository (where issues and PRs will be created) and the repository containing your workflow > 👉 GitHub Actions' default GITHUB_TOKEN cannot be used here. 📚 Learn more • Creating a fine-grained PAT • Creating repository secrets --- • Run your first scan Trigger the workflow manually or automatically based on your configuration. The a11y scanner will run and create issues for any accessibility findings. When issues are assigned to GitHub Copilot, always review proposed fixes before merging. 📚 Learn more • View workflow run history • Running a workflow manually • Re-run workflows and jobs --- Action inputs | Input | Required | Description | Example | | ------------------------- | -------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------- | | | Yes | Newline-delimited list of URLs to scan | | | | Yes | Repository (with owner) for issues and PRs | | | | Yes | PAT with write permissions (see above) | | | | Yes | Key for caching results across runs Allowed: | | | | No | If scanned pages require authentication, the URL of the login page | | | | No | If scanned pages require authentication, the username to use for login | | | | No | If scanned pages require authentication, the password to use for login | | | | No | If scanned pages require authentication, a stringified JSON object containing username, password, cookies, and/or localStorage from an authenticated session | | | | No | Whether to skip assigning filed issues to GitHub Copilot. Set to if you don't have GitHub Copilot or prefer to handle issues manually | | | | No | Whether to capture screenshots of scanned pages and include links to them in filed issues. Screenshots are stored on the branch of the repository running the workflow. Default: | | | | No | Playwright setting for scan contexts. Allowed values: , | | | | No | Playwright setting for scan contexts. Allowed values: , , | | | | No | An array of scans (or plugins) to be performed. If not provided, only Axe will be performed. | | --- Authentication If access to a page requires logging-in first, and logging-in requires only a username and password, then provide the , , and inputs. If your login flow is more complex—if it requires two-factor authentication, single sign-on, passkeys, etc.—and you have a custom action that authenticates with Playwright and persists authenticated session state to a file, then provide the input. (If is provided, , , and will be ignored.) > [!IMPORTANT] > Don't put passwords in your workflow as plain text; instead reference a repository secret. --- Configuring GitHub Copilot The a11y scanner leverages GitHub Copilot coding agent, which can be configured with custom instructions: • **Repository-wide:** • **Directory/file-scoped:** 📚 Learn more • Adding repository custom instructions • Optimizing GitHub Copilot for accessibility • GitHub Copilot .instructions.md support • GitHub Copilot agents.md support --- Plugins See the plugin docs for more information --- Feedback 💬 We welcome your feedback! To submit feedback or report issues, please create an issue in this repository. For more information on contributing, please refer to the CONTRIBUTING file. How We Decide What to Build Next We love hearing ideas and suggestions from the community — your feedback genuinely helps shape our thinking. That said, we want to be upfront: **there's no guarantee that any specific feature request will be implemented.** Our team prioritizes upcoming work based on a number of factors, including: • Alignment with the Action's core mission (website accessibility scanning) • The complexity and scope of the work involved • How many users would benefit from the change • Our current bandwidth and roadmap commitments We read every suggestion and appreciate the…