The Invisible Users You Don't Know About

Who they are:

• • Blind users relying on screen readers (JAWS, NVDA)
• • Low vision users needing high contrast
• • Color blind users (8% of men, 0.5% of women)
• • Elderly with age-related macular degeneration

What breaks for them:

• • Streaming text that screen readers can't parse
• • Images without alt text
• • Low contrast interfaces
• • Visual-only CAPTCHAs

Who they are:

• • Rural communities with 2G/3G connections
• • Low-income users with data limits
• • Users in developing nations
• • People sharing devices/connections

What breaks for them:

• • 500KB+ responses take 15+ seconds on slow connections
• • Heavy JavaScript requirements
• • No offline modes
• • Auto-loading images and videos

Who they are:

• • 6.5 billion non-native English speakers
• • Users from non-Western cultures
• • Multilingual families
• • Immigrants and refugees

What breaks for them:

• • AI trained on 96% English data
• • Cultural references they don't understand
• • Idioms that don't translate
• • English-only interfaces

Who they are:

• • Elderly users (65+, 727 million globally)
• • People with limited tech experience
• • Users with cognitive disabilities
• • Those with motor impairments

What breaks for them:

• • Small touch targets and buttons
• • Rapid UI changes and animations
• • Complex navigation patterns
• • No option to slow down or pause