PDFs on SF.gov

If at all possible, publish the content from a PDF on an info page. We avoid PDFs on SF.gov since they are not accessible on phones (55% of our site visitors). People have to zoom in to read them.

Handling PDFs on SF.gov

PDF accessibility basics

  1. Save your PDFs from text, like Word. At least search engines and screenreaders will be able to parse them. Saving a scanned image as a PDF is not accessible for anyone.

  2. Use Word styles and headings. See more on Microsoft’s site.

  3. Save your Word doc with “Document structure tags for accessibility” checked. See more on Microsoft’s site.

See a lot more details about Word-to-PDF accessibility (from documentation originally for the City of LA)