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Lunarlink Solutions, Toronto
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Alt text is a short written description attached to an image, read aloud by screen readers and shown when the image fails to load. It should describe what the image conveys in the context of the page, in a sentence or less, and it should be left deliberately empty for images that are purely decorative.
The right description depends on why the image is there. A photo of a finished roof on a case study page might be described as the completed asphalt shingle replacement on a two storey semi. The same photo in a gallery of textures might need nothing at all. Alt text answers what a sighted reader would take from the image, not what is technically visible in it.
Decorative images get an empty alt attribute, written as alt equals nothing rather than omitted. That tells a screen reader to skip the image silently. Omitting the attribute entirely makes some screen readers announce the filename instead, which is how a visually impaired visitor ends up hearing a string of digits and hyphens read out loud.
Alt text repeating a target phrase on every image is read aloud, word for word, to the people the attribute exists to serve. It is a bad experience for them, it is a recognised spam signal, and it is one of the more common findings in an accessibility complaint.
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