Despite many cautionary warnings, the phrase 'click here' as a hyperlink is still commonly used across the web

Website Accessibility

It has been long recognised that using 'click here' creates a number of accessibility issues. It is especially annoying for people with visual impairments who use screen readers to navigate around your website.

The problem with using just 'click here' as a hyperlink is that it doesn't provide any meaningful information about where the link goes or what it does.

Screen reading software will rely on hyperlinked text to provide important contextual information to the listener about the link's destination and purpose.

How to improve your links

When 'click here' is used on a page, the screen reader will read out these two words. The listener will hear the instruction, 'click here', but without useful context the link is rather meaningless. This may leave your listener rather bewildered or even perplexed about what to do next.

To improve the accessibility of links, it's important to use descriptive text that accurately describes the link's destination (and purpose). For example, if the link leads to a document, it could be labelled 'Download our PDF document' or 'View the report'.

This allows users to understand where the link goes and what to expect when they activate it, regardless of how they are accessing the web.

Multiple uses of click here

Sometimes web authors will even use 'click here' multiple times on a page, this just increases the problem. To speed things up, screen reader users may choose to listen to a list of all the links on the page. The screen reader will just read out the links without the surrounding text. If 'click here' is used multiple times on the page the issue is then amplified, imagine having to listen to 'click here, six or seven times, very annoying!

Summary

In summary, using 'click here' as a hyperlink creates accessibility issues that can impact people with visual disabilities. To ensure that your website is accessible to everyone, make an effort to always use descriptive text that accurately describes the link's purpose and destination.

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