Why alt text matters
Image alt text (alternative text) is the text that describes an image to someone who can't see it. It's used by:
- Screen readers — to read the image description aloud to blind and low-vision users.
- Browsers — to show text when an image fails to load.
- Search engines — to understand what an image contains, which helps with Google Images ranking.
- Accessibility laws — the EU Accessibility Act (EAA) now requires alt text for ecommerce images.
alt attribute. If it's missing or says something like "product image", you've found an issue.
What "missing alt text" looks like
There are four common issues:
| Issue | Example | Why it's a problem |
|---|---|---|
| Missing alt | <img src="photo.jpg"> | No alt attribute at all |
| Empty alt | alt="" | Intentionally empty is OK for decorations, but not for product images |
| Too vague | alt="product image" | Doesn't describe the specific image |
| Too long | alt="A beautiful high-quality organic cotton canvas tote bag in natural beige with long sturdy handles and a small green leaf print detail on the front pocket perfect for everyday use" | Over 150 characters; screen readers will truncate |
How to check your website
You can check alt text manually, but for pages with dozens of images, that's slow. Here's the fast way:
Our free tool scans one public page at a time. It finds missing, empty, vague, and overlong alt text, then gives you a report you can review.
The tool works on any public HTML page — your homepage, a product page, a blog post, or a category page. It doesn't require a login, and it doesn't install anything on your site.
Understanding your scan results
After scanning, you'll see a table with four columns:
- Image — the image URL or filename
- Current alt — what the alt text says now (or "(empty)")
- Issue — Missing alt / Empty alt / Too vague / Too long / Looks okay
- Suggested fix — a suggested alt text based on the image filename and page title
What to do with the results
If you have a few fixes, you can update them by hand. If you have dozens, the Pro plan lets you export the full table as a CSV file.
You can then share the CSV with your developer, or use it as a checklist for bulk updates in your CMS.
Once you have your list of issues, the fix is usually straightforward: edit the alt attribute on each <img> tag. For ecommerce sites, focus on product images first — they have the most impact on both accessibility and SEO.