Hot take: light gray text on white is not 'clean', it's just broken

I keep seeing these dashboard mockups where the secondary text is like #B0B0B0 on a white background. At a glance it looks modern and soft, but I ran one through a contrast checker and it came out at 2.8:1, which fails even the basic WCAG AA level for normal text. The kicker is the person who designed it told me 'users can still read it if they zoom in', but that ignores people with low vision who don't zoom, they just give up. So which side are you on: sacrificing strict contrast for that airy look, or forcing everyone to use darker grays that feel clunky? I've had clients in Portland push back on this twice in the last month, and I'm curious if anyone else fights this same battle.

1 comments

1 Comment

reeseanderson19d ago

Read a study last year that said most users don't even notice the contrast until they can't read it.