A 2020 lawsuit against Finish Line cited white text on light green buttons. The complaint measured it at 1.84:1, against a 4.5:1 minimum. Scan your page and see which lines fail that same test, and the color that fixes it. Once monitoring starts, we keep re-checking every page, so you hear about it when a new photo or banner makes text hard to read again.
Sources: Seyfarth Shaw, 2025 federal filings; complaint against Finish Line, Inc., S.D. Ind. No. 1:20-cv-02756.
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A standard scanner says
Needs review (text over an image)
AccessibilityAlert says
Fails at 1.04:1, with a fix
Automated contrast check of one page; not a full accessibility audit.
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An accessibility claim against a website can cost real money. Here is what the law allows and what other accessibility cases have cost, then the complaints that quoted a site's contrast ratio word for word.
Federal ADA civil penalty, maximum
$236,451
The maximum the Justice Department can seek for a subsequent violation by a business open to the public, and $118,225 for a first. Available only when the U.S. Attorney General sues.
28 CFR 85.5, 2025 levels, still in force in 2026
California statute, minimum
$4,000
The minimum per violation under California's Unruh Civil Rights Act, "in no case less than four thousand dollars ($4,000)", plus attorney's fees. Online-only businesses usually can't be held to it through the ADA (see the note below).
New York statute, per violation
Up to $500 per violation
The penalty under New York Civil Rights Law §40-d. A $500 demand under it appears in four of the complaints below.
Attorneys' fees in a captioning case, not contrast
$755,000
The attorneys' fees and costs Netflix agreed to pay in a 2012 consent decree over captions on streaming video.
Class settlement in a screen-reader case, not contrast
$6,000,000
The class settlement fund Target paid to a California class under a 2008 settlement. The court found the payment "fair, reasonable and adequate".
27%
more website accessibility lawsuits in federal court in 2025 than in 2024.
From Seyfarth Shaw
45%
of 2025 federal digital accessibility suits named companies that had been sued before.
70%
of 2025 digital accessibility lawsuits were against online stores.
Get your own contrast ratio before someone else quotes it. One page, no account.
These are some that named contrast. Each shows what the complaint asked for, then the contrast it quoted. None has a public settlement amount.
Up to $500 per violation
Sought under NY Civil Rights Law §40-d, plus damages "in an amount to be determined" and attorneys' fees.
1.67:1 contrast ratio quoted in the complaint
"the 'apply' button has insufficient color contrast. Required minimum is 4.5. Actual is 1.67."
Voluntarily dismissed in April 2019; no payment disclosed.
Court order + attorneys' fees
No dollar amount stated. The complaint sought a court order plus attorneys' fees and costs under the ADA.
1.84:1 contrast ratio quoted in the complaint
"The white letters in the light green buttons do not meet the minimum threshold requirements ... This text has a contrast ratio of 1.84:1."
Ended in a consent judgment in February 2021; terms not public.
$500 sought in each
Three New York complaints each sought $500 under NY Civil Rights Law §40-d, a penalty of up to $500 per violation, plus attorneys' fees.
The AZEK Company Inc.
Sought: compensatory damages of five hundred dollars ($500.00)
barriers "including ... insufficient color contrast"
Voluntarily dismissed; no payment disclosed.
ABC HoldCo, LLC (ABC Home)
Sought: compensatory damages of five hundred dollars ($500.00)
lists "low-contrast text" among "pervasive WCAG 2.1 Level AA violations"
Pending; no payment disclosed.
Oroboro, Inc.
Sought: compensatory damages of five hundred dollars per instance
"insufficient color contrast on the focus indicator"
Voluntarily dismissed in April 2025; no payment disclosed.
Justice Department agreement
No payment. The agreements required the sites to be fixed.
"individuals with low vision encountered text and links that had low color contrast with the website's background."
That is from the Rite Aid agreement about its vaccine sign-up site. The Meijer and Kroger agreements describe the same problem. All three agreed to fix their sites, and each denied violating the ADA.
Rite Aid agreement · Meijer agreement · Kroger agreement (Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse)
Damages, penalties + attorneys' fees
No dollar amount stated. The 2026 complaint quoted here sought statutory and compensatory damages under New York law, civil penalties and attorneys' fees.
"insufficient color contrast throughout the Website (WCAG 1.4.3)"
21 federal filings use the phrase "insufficient color contrast" about a website. The quote is from a July 2026 complaint, No. 1:26-cv-06139 (S.D.N.Y.), which was voluntarily dismissed the next day.
A complaint can quote your ratio to two decimal places. You can get the same number for your own page in under a minute.
Check your own contrast ratio nowThese figures are maximums, minimums and examples from statutes and court records. Only the Netflix and Target figures are amounts a business agreed to pay, and most website suits settle confidentially. The federal penalties apply only when the U.S. Attorney General sues. California appeals courts have held that the ADA doesn't cover online-only businesses, so they usually can't be held to the $4,000 minimum through an ADA claim (Cot'n Wash, 2022; THI E-Commerce, 2023); sites tied to a physical business still are. The Netflix and Target cases were about captions and screen readers, not contrast. Complaints are allegations, and several defendants denied liability. The Justice Department "does not endorse WCAG" as the standard for private businesses under Title III, according to its 2026 filing in the Fashion Nova case as quoted by Seyfarth Shaw. AccessibilityAlert measures contrast; it does not make a site compliant or stop lawsuits. Nothing on this page is legal advice.
Common checkers can miss text over photos and fades. We measure it.
When words sit on a photo or a fading color, common checkers can miss them. Some ask for a check by hand, and that leaves it to you.
We give each line a score. Higher is easier to read. Normal text needs at least 4.5:1.
83.9% of the top million home pages have low-contrast text: words too close in color to what's behind them (WebAIM Million, 2026). Their checker can't see photos or fades either, so the real number is likely higher.
We open your page in a real browser and take a picture of it. Then we check every line of words against the colors right behind it. You see what's too hard to read, and the color that fixes it.
It adds a button on top of your site. The hard-to-read words underneath stay the same. UsableNet's 2025 report says "Accessibility widgets did not slow litigation in 2025." It adds: "An increasing number of lawsuits were filed against companies already using these tools."
You type in two colors and it tells you if they work together. It can't see the photo or fade behind your words. If two colors are all you need, use our free contrast checker.
Your site changes all the time, and a new banner or photo can make words hard to read again. A one-time audit checks once. We re-check every page on a schedule, so the change that broke something gets caught.
When something breaks, you get one short email. It says what broke, what got fixed, and the color to use. Every scan is dated and saved, so you keep a record that you checked.
From AccessibilityAlertExample
1 new contrast failure on harborkitchen.com
#737373 (4.55:1).
Fixed since last check: 2. Unchanged: 20.
Contrast monitoring for your whole site, billed monthly.
Monitoring opens soon. When it does, we scan every early-access site first.
Lock in $49 a month for as long as you stay subscribed
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Founding spots go to the first 50 sign-ups.
If your first full-site scan doesn't find a single contrast problem that standard scanners leave for review or miss, your first month is free.
No, and no tool can promise that. AccessibilityAlert checks one thing: whether people can read your text against what's behind it. A full accessibility review covers much more, such as keyboard use, screen readers and forms.
No. There's no script to add to your site. We load your pages the way a visitor's browser does.
A chatbot can tell you if two colors you paste in work together. It can't open every page of your site in a real browser, measure words sitting on a photo, and then do it again after your next update. That repeat work is what the $49 pays for.