Rant: Why I stopped using that contrast checker app after last Wednesday

I always swore by that WCAG AA contrast checker app on my phone. Used it for like 3 years on every project. Then last Wednesday I was designing a sign for a local library event in Austin, and I kept getting that stupid red X on a light yellow background with dark blue text. I spent 45 minutes tweaking colors just to get the checkmark. My student teacher saw me and asked why I was fighting it so hard. I showed her the app and she just pulled out a printed piece of paper with the same colors on it and asked if I could read it fine. I could, no problem. She said the app uses some outdated formula that doesn't account for modern screen brightness or real world lighting. I felt like an idiot. Now I just print a test page and ask a couple coworkers with different eyesight to check it. That Wednesday changed my whole process. Has anyone else had a design tool lie to them like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

charles_henderson5d ago

Has it ever crossed your mind that a lot of these so-called "objective" standards are just someone's best guess from a decade ago that got accepted as gospel? It's like those food expiration dates that are way too strict, they make you toss perfectly good stuff just because a calendar told you to.

patricia_wright4d ago

60 bucks for an app that tells you your colors are wrong and then you find out it's basically using a calculator from 2012. I bet that student teacher saved you like 40 hours of unnecessary color tweaking over the next year alone. Guess we should all just throw our color pickers in the trash and find a real human with functioning eyes. Maybe the next update will add a "looks fine to me" toggle.