ADA compliance for Shopify stores: what the law asks and what no app can promise

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a US civil rights law. Its Title III covers businesses open to the public, and US courts and the Department of Justice have treated many business websites as covered by it. There is no ADA certificate for a website, and no app can give you one.

Why everyone mentions WCAG

The ADA does not set technical rules for private websites. Lawsuits, demand letters and settlements usually measure a site against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), published by the W3C. WCAG is the yardstick; the ADA is the law people sue under.

Why “instant ADA compliance” is a red flag

• A widget does not change your theme. It adds a toolbar on top (what accessibility widgets do); the unlabelled button underneath stays unlabelled.
• A widget has not kept businesses out of court. UsableNet, which tracks these cases, reports that about 20% of the businesses sued over website accessibility already had a widget or overlay installed.
• The promise itself has been punished. In 2025 the US Federal Trade Commission fined an overlay vendor $1 million over how its product was advertised.

What you can actually do

• Fix what blocks people, in the theme itself: labels, contrast, alt text, keyboard paths.
• Check again after every theme or app change — what a checker finds and misses.
• Keep dates: what was found, what was fixed, when.
• Publish an accessibility statement with a way to contact you.

This is not legal advice — for that, talk to a lawyer. What we offer is the record part: Barrier Watch checks your store weekly and keeps a dated history of findings and fixes. It never claims compliance on your behalf. See the record.