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Accessibility statement for Oxweb

This statement applies to the University of Oxford’s primary website at www.ox.ac.uk.

This website is run by the Public Affairs Directorate at the University of Oxford. 

The University of Oxford is committed to providing an accessible web presence that gives members of the public and members of the University community full access to University information, courses and activities offered publicly through the web. Our Equality Policy outlines our commitment to a culture which ‘maintains a working, learning and social environment in which the rights and dignity of all its staff and students are respected’.

Our aims

We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website, and these pages aim to WCAG 2.2 AA standard. For example, that means you should be able to:

  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader

All essential audiovisual information is captioned, described as necessary or provided in alternative formats.

Guidance is available for editors and moderators of this site to help them maintain accessibility standards.

Making changes to your device or system

AbilityNet has advice on making your devices easier to use if you have a disability. In addition, major operating systems produce the following guidance:

How accessible this website is

We are aware that some parts of our website are not fully accessible. These include:

  • Users may have difficult navigating parts of listing pages (such as news listings) with a keyboard
  • Screen reader users may have difficulty reading some PDFs (see 'Graduate Course Information Sheet' information below)
  • Although all audio on videos is captioned, some multimedia content doesn’t yet have audio or text description

We are working to address areas where our accessibility needs improvement. Please see 'Technical information' below for more details.

Feedback and contact information

If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact the webmaster at [email protected]. 

Our Graduate Course Information Sheets, particularly older ones, may not be accessible. To request an accessible version of a Course Information Sheet, please contact Graduate Admissions by sending an email to [email protected]. 

Other accessibility resources

The Accessible Resources Acquisition and Creation Unit (ARACU), who are part of the Bodleian Libraries, offer alternative formats for pages on this website for students referred by the Disability Advisory Services. They produce materials in electronic text (RTF document fully structured and with XML tags for navigation) and DAISY 2.02 human voice audio. Both products can be sent out physically (DVD) or via file transfer. They can also produce Braille documents. Please contact [email protected] to discuss your requirements.

Students and staff of the University may make use of the free SensusAccess tool on the Bodleian website to convert certain types of files into a more accessible format, such as accessible text, audio, e-book or digital braille. Content editors may also make use of this tool on behalf of website users.

If you’d like more information about accessibility and resources for students, staff and visitors in Oxford more generally, please visit our Equality and Diversity pages. 

If you’re looking for information on the accessibility of the University's buildings, please try the Access Guide or the University’s interactive map.

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

The University of Oxford is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

Compliance status

The website has been tested against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standard.

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

Non-accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

  • Keyboard navigations on listing pages (eg news listings or course listings) doesn’t function correctly; you can’t currently tab to all filters such as categories, and trying to tab backwards doesn’t work as it should.
  • Some PDF documents aren’t fully accessible to screen reader software (see 'Course Information Sheet' information below)
  • Although all audio on videos is captioned, some multimedia content doesn’t yet have audio or text description

We are working to address areas where our accessibility needs improvement. 

  • The keyboard navigation issue on listing pages is currently under review and will be fixed within the coming weeks.
  • We are working to address the template for course information sheets in order to make these PDFs accessible for the next admission year.
  • We are working to add audio or text description to multimedia that needs it.

Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

  • The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.
  • Accessibility regulations do not require us to address map accessibility. The website relies on the University maps service to deliver these, but provides essential information like addresses in an accessible format.
  • Our site includes third-party content and functionality. This may direct you to a related service, link to another site or supporting documentation. We are not responsible for the accessibility of third-party content or to other sites we link to. Where we are legally required to feature third party content or functionality, we cannot reasonably accept responsibility for ensuring it meets accessibility standards. However, where it is within our control, we will make every reasonable effort to work towards meeting accessibility requirements.
  • We often create content which is hosted on third-party platforms. This includes content we create for social media, video which we host on YouTube, SoundCloud or Vimeo, and data we supply to national databases. We are responsible for ensuring the content we supply meets accessibility requirements; however, we are not responsible for the accessibility of the platforms themselves

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

We want our websites to offer the best experience possible for all of our users. To achieve this, we are working in several ways:

  • building in compliance checking at the page level using automated tools
  • reviewing platform updates for opportunities to improve accessibility
  • working with colleagues within the Content Network to share and promote good accessibility practice across web and communications teams at Oxford
  • working with the UX team and the Accessibility Officer to continually improve our processes for ensuring accessibility is addressed 

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared and last reviewed on 8 April 2026. 

This website was last tested on 8 April 2026 against the WCAG 2.2 AA standard.

Testing on functionality and overall accessibility was carried out by an external partner, while content testing was managed by internal teams. Content testing was managed using a quality assurance tool across all pages as well as a manual check of a substantial and carefully chosen sample of pages and content types. We continue to review the site on a monthly basis to check new content.

Other sites within our domain

The University of Oxford’s web estate consists of many related sites with the ox.ac.uk domain, including various divisions and departments, museums and libraries, administrative sites and more. Accessibility statements for such sub-sites will be found locally on each site.