Allyant CTO Ferass Elrayes: Web Accessibility ‘Not a feature or Checkbox’

Early last month, Ottawa-based Allyant put out a press release in which the Canadian web accessibility company shared what it called “the market’s first large-scale, cross-industry analysis of public-facing PDF accessibility” in the PDF Accessibility Index: 2025–2026 Benchmark Report. Allyant’s findings, based on nearly 645,000 documents, reveal a staggering 95% of PDFs were discovered to be inaccessible, leading to “widespread barriers for people with disabilities,” according to Allyant.

“While accessibility conversations often center around websites and applications, the report underscores a critical miss: PDFs remain among the most relied-upon formats for delivering essential information—and among the least accessible,” Allyant wrote.

The company released the PDF Accessibility Index as a PDF itself, of course.

As Allyant noted, the release of the aforementioned Index is timely given the regulatory scrutiny around web accessibility parameters. Indeed, the company said “regulatory expectations [are rising]” in 2026, what with compliance deadlines approaching involving Title II of the American with Disabilities Act in the United States, as well as similarly-scoped initiatives for Health and Human Services (HHS) accessibility requirements and European Accessibility Act (EAA) requirements already in effect.

Late last month, I had the opportunity to connect with Allyant’s chief technology officer in Ferass Elrayes for a brief email interview about the findings. At 30,000 feet, he explained the main issue with inaccessible PDFs boil down to three things: “impact, risk, and scale.” There’s a real sense of urgency to address this problem, he went on, because of PDFs’ ubiquity; they’re “high-volume, often decentralized, and frequently created without accessibility in mind.” What this means in practice is organizations are hoarding “thousands” of inaccessible documents which not only run the risk of non-compliance, the byproduct of which is real, daily barriers to people with disabilities.

“PDFs are one of the most relied-upon formats for delivering critical information—applications, policies, medical instructions, financial disclosures and more. But for many people who rely on assistive technology, they’re also one of the most persistent barriers,” Elrayes said of the file format’s ubiquitousness. “When a PDF isn’t accessible, it’s not just inconvenient—it can prevent someone from completing a form, reading medical test results, or accessing essential services independently.”

Beyond the obvious legal pressure, Elrayes said those in the disability community have (unsurprisingly) proven to be “a major driver of change,” adding considering the Justice Department’s edict on standards, “the standards and expectations are now clear” and the community can hold companies accountable for (in)accessibility.

“For years, people with disabilities have been vocal about the barriers they face with PDFs—particularly screen reader users encountering documents that are unreadable or impossible to navigate. What’s changing now is that those lived experiences are intersecting with broader awareness, renewed regulatory pressure, and organizational accountability.” Elrayes said. “The PDF Accessibility Index doesn’t create that momentum—it validates it. It gives organizations the data to understand that these aren’t edge cases; they’re systemic issues affecting millions of users.”

When asked about Allyant’s study, Elrayes told me while the headliner is “stark”—95% of PDFs are barriers—there are “deeper insights that matter most.” He cited four of them, emphasizing the tried-and-true notion that inaccessibility more often is the norm instead of the exception. Crucially, only 5% of PDFs have basic usability, which means “they may contain a warning-level issue but no accessibility failures,” according to Elrayes. Likewise, he also noted less than 1% of PDFs are “truly accessible,” with Elrayes saying “scanning has identified at least one failing issue.”

“In practice, this means most organizations have far more exposure than they realize because it’s probable the vast majority of their documents fail accessibility standards,” he added.

Elsewhere, Elrayes told me high-risk industries are amongst “the worst offenders” while also excoriating the government and education sectors for showing “the highest inaccessibility rates.” On the bright side, however, Elrayes noted healthcare is “showing progress” but still falls short, telling me “the majority of healthcare PDFs are still inaccessible” despite performing better than, say, government or education.

“The issues are foundational, not highly technical. This is the good news. Common failures include things like missing structure, headings, metadata, and table relationships,” Elrayes said. “Overall, the takeaway is this—organizations don’t just have a compliance gap—they have a process and governance gap when it comes to document creation.”

Feedback-wise, Elrayes said reception to Allyant’s efforts have been “a mix of expectation, validation, and—importantly—relief.” He described the company’s Report as “the market’s first true benchmark” and adde accessibility has heretofore largely been an “unknown” commodity, saying “teams knew it was a problem, but they didn’t know how widespread it was or how their industry—or their organization—compared.”

He continued: “The [study’s] findings aren’t entirely unexpected. Popular websites have been scanned for years, also revealing similar high percentages of failure. In addition to expectation, there’s relief in finally having data to support internal conversations, a way to benchmark against the market, with clarity on where and how to prioritize. However, at the same time, similar to the state of website accessibility, the findings are sobering. Nearly every organization recognizes themselves somewhere in the data. But that’s also what makes the report powerful—it shifts the conversation from ‘Are we failing?’ to ‘Now that we know, how do we move forward?’

Elrayes ended our correspondence by making it crystal clear Allyant’s main goal with publishing the PDF Accessibility Index is neither to put anyone on blast nor antagonize them. The intention, he said, “moving the industry forward” towards great accessibility for everyone. With the DOJ’s impending guidelines, the market can use Allyant’s data to “understand where their organization ranks, and how they can make forward progress.” Moreover, Elrayes said most organizations don’t ignore accessibility out of malice or spite, rather “they’re navigating complex systems, legacy content, and decentralized workflows.” The endgame, he added, is Allyant’s information can be a “catalyst for change,” which, distilled, indeed is the company’s primary motivation.

“Instead of continuing to react to issues one PDF at a time, organizations can now take a more strategic approach to benchmark where they stand, focus on high-impact improvements, embed accessibility into document creation—not just remediation, and monitor their progress. But the key is progress over perfection. This isn’t a quick-fix project, it’s a long-term commitment. And an important one,” Elrayes said. “Ultimately, accessibility isn’t a feature or a checkbox—it’s access. And for millions of people, that access starts with the documents organizations publish every day.”