As we wrap up 2025, our team at Centre for Accessibility Australia (CFA Australia) is sharing the accessibility features, tools, and stories that stood out to us in the last year. Below are our picks, in our own words.
Dr. Hollier, our CEO, has said the growing ability to use AI to create alternative text for images is his pick for the year. “While not always accurate,” he says, “As a blind person it’s great I can go through my photo collection and AI can help me figure out which photos are which.“ AI image descriptions use artificial intelligence to generate text descriptions of images, making visual content more accessible to people who are blind or have low vision. You can dive deeper in our articles on Microsoft’s update to Narrator using AI to provide detailed descriptions of images.
Yuemei, our Strategic Operations Manager, also focusing on the advance in AI with digital accessibility, mentions Android’s Expressive Captions making audio captions more immersive for people who are Deaf or hard of hearing. Android’s Expressive Captions uses AI to bring emotion to captions. “It isn’t 100% accurate,” Yuemi says, but she is excited about how this could develop.
Moving over to gaming which has seen some pretty cool accessibility advancements this year, Owen, one of our Junior Digital Accessibility Analysts, is excited about two accessibility features that have just been included recently. “World of Warcraft included two accessibility features recently,” he said, “Assisted Highlight and Single Button Assistant. Assisted Highlight applies a blue border on recommended abilities to provide visual guidance in learning and using class rotations. Single Button Assistant will cycle through your abilities, allowing you to do your class ability rotations with a single button.”
Chris, our Senior Accessibility Analyst and Technical Lead pinpoints a driving simulator developed by MyDriveSchool and Support and Connect as a highlight. He says, “As someone who is fond of cars, I enjoyed this story on providing simulator training to help people with disability develop their driving competency and gain more independence.”
Jasmine, our Events and Marketing Team Strategist pivots towards exciting advancements in social media. “I loved seeing TikTok rolling out new accessibility features this year like expanding on its alt text to photo posts.“ She loves that this not only benefits TikTok audiences, but will also encourage more creators with disability to join the platform and create.
Laetitia, our Digital Content Officer concedes that it was difficult to choose which was her highlight this year as there was so much cool stuff that came out in gaming. But given she does all things copy and content, she would have to mention the release of Part 2 of the Plain Language Standard. “This is a new international standard (ISO 24495-2:2025),” she explains, “That provides guidelines for using plain language in legal communications, helping make complex information clearer for everyone, especially in legal, government, and medical contexts.“
It’s been fantastic keeping up with all the awesome digital accessibility advancements in 2025. From AI-powered image descriptions to immersive captions and accessible gaming features, and everything in between, there’s been heaps to celebrate.
As a team, we all agree we have the fun job! We’re stoked to see what 2026 brings!
Stay tuned for more updates on our news page in the new year.
Thank you for being a part of our social movement!