Is your site ready for AI agents?
Browser agents read the same labels, roles and structure that screen readers use. Pages that fail people using assistive technology tend to trip agents up too.
How agents read a page
Most browsing agents combine what they can parse with what they can see.
- The HTML
- Element types, attributes and text in the rendered page.
- The accessibility tree
- The browser's map of controls, names and roles, the same one assistive technology reads.
- Screenshots
- What the page looks like, read by a vision model when the structure isn't enough.
What agents need, and the check that finds it
Every item is a WCAG requirement the free audit already checks.
| What agents need | Check |
|---|---|
| Real buttons and links Agents look for elements the browser reports as interactive. A clickable div often isn't. | Keyboard and focus checker |
| Labelled form fields The label tells an agent what to type into each field. | Form labels checker |
| Names for controls and links An icon button with no name gives an agent nothing to choose by. | ARIA checker |
| Link text that says where it goes Ten links called "Read more" look identical in the accessibility tree. | Link text checker |
| A clear heading outline and landmarks Headings and regions let an agent find the part of the page it needs. | Headings and landmarks checker |
| Text alternatives for images Agents reading the page structure can't see what an image shows without alt text. | Alt text checker |
| Readable contrast Agents that work from screenshots read low-contrast text less reliably, as people do. | Color contrast checker |
| Targets big enough to hit Agents that click by coordinates miss small, crowded targets. | Target size checker |
What an audit can't tell you
- Whether a particular agent can finish a task end to end, such as checking out or booking.
- Whether bot checks, cookie banners or pop-ups block agents before they reach the page.
- How each agent behaves, since they change often and work in different ways.
Questions
What does AI agent ready mean?
It means a browsing agent, such as those from Anthropic, OpenAI, Perplexity or Google, can find its way around your pages, fill in forms and press the right buttons without getting stuck.
Is accessibility the same as agent readiness?
They overlap a lot but aren't identical. Agents read the page structure and the accessibility tree that assistive technology uses, so labels, roles and headings help both. Agents also struggle with things WCAG doesn't cover, such as bot checks and pop-ups.
Does AccessGuard give an agent readiness score?
No. It audits pages against WCAG 2.2 AA. The findings in the table above are the ones that also get in an agent's way, so fixing them helps people and agents at the same time.
Will fixing these issues get my site cited in AI search?
Nobody can promise that. Clear headings, real text and labelled structure make a page easier for any machine to read, but AI search products don't publish how they choose sources.
Find what gets in the way on your site
Run a free audit of any page. Results in about a minute.