Making Your Website Easy to Use for Older Visitors

On this page

1. Common difficulties
2. Practical improvements
3. Trust and reassurance
4. Test with real people

Older adults are a large and growing group of internet users, and often key customers for healthcare, pharmacies, temples, travel, insurance and financial services. Many websites are unintentionally hard for them to use. Small design choices make a big difference.

Common difficulties

• Small or low-contrast text
• Tiny buttons and links that are hard to tap
• Complicated menus and too many choices
• Pop-ups, auto-playing media and moving content
• Long or confusing forms with unclear errors

Practical improvements

Readable text

• Body text of at least 16–18px, with comfortable line spacing
• Strong contrast: dark text on a light background
• Clear, simple fonts, and avoid long paragraphs in all caps or italics

Simple navigation

• A short, clearly labelled menu using familiar words ("Timings", "Contact", "Book appointment")
• Consistent layout from page to page
• Visible "Home" link and breadcrumbs

Easy buttons and links

• Large tap targets with space between them
• Buttons that look like buttons, with clear text
• Underlined links in text

Friendly forms

• Few fields, with visible labels above each
• Clear error messages that explain how to fix the problem
• Alternatives: phone and WhatsApp for people who prefer to talk

Calm pages

• No auto-playing videos, flashing banners or aggressive pop-ups
• Plenty of white space

For visitors with hearing loss, a phone call can be the hardest way to reach you, so always offer WhatsApp, email or a form as well; see websites for hearing aid centres.

Trust and reassurance

Older visitors may be more cautious about scams. Show clear contact details, a physical address, real photos and straightforward policies. Avoid pressure tactics.

Test with real people

Ask an older relative or customer to complete a common task on your site, such as finding timings or booking an appointment, and watch where they struggle. It's the most valuable test you can run.

These improvements overlap with general accessibility basics and help every visitor. They're especially important for healthcare and temple and community websites.