How much should you charge for an accessibility audit?
Published 2026 rates put small-business WCAG audits at roughly $2,000–$7,000, mid-size at $7,000–$25,000, and enterprise at $50,000+. Per-page pricing commonly runs $100–$250, dropping to $25–$100 for simple pages. Independent freelancers bill roughly $75–$175 per hour. But copying any of those numbers is the wrong move, and this page explains what to do instead.
The published market rates
These figures come from vendors and consultancies who publish their pricing openly. Read the caveat below them before you use any of them.
| Service | Published range |
|---|---|
| Audit — small business site | $2,000 – $7,000 |
| Audit — mid-size site | $7,000 – $25,000 |
| Audit — enterprise | $50,000+ |
| Audit — per page / screen | $100 – $250 ($25 – $100 for light pages) |
| Freelance consultant, hourly | $75 – $175 (most engagements $100 – $200) |
| Freelance auditor, hourly | $75 – $150 |
| VPAT / conformance report document | $350 – $950 |
| VPAT including prerequisite audit | $2,000 – $5,000 (audit alone $1,500 – $5,500) |
| Web remediation, per page | $250 – $550 |
| PDF remediation, per page | $5 – $25 |
Read these numbers sceptically
Almost every published pricing guide in this field is written by someone selling the service. Vendors have an obvious interest in anchoring the market high, and there is no independent survey to check them against. The ranges are also heavily US-weighted — European and Commonwealth rates typically sit lower — and the spread within each row is so wide that "small business audit" spanning $2,000 to $7,000 tells you almost nothing about what you should quote. Treat this table as a sanity check on your own numbers, not as a price list.
Why per-page pricing is a trap
Per-page pricing looks attractive because it is easy to quote. It creates two problems.
It misprices the work. A 40,000-product store has perhaps twelve distinct templates. The forty-thousandth product page costs you nothing to test, because you already tested that template. Quoting per page either bankrupts the client or forces you to invent a discount schedule you cannot justify.
It invites the wrong conversation. Once you are priced per page, every negotiation is about reducing the page count, and the pages that get cut are the expensive-to-test ones — checkout, account creation, error states — which are exactly where the findings live.
Price by template and journey instead. "Twelve templates and four journeys" is a scope a client can understand, and it maps to the work you will actually do.
How to set your number
There is only one honest method, and it is unglamorous.
- Run one audit and time it. Your own site, or a client's with permission. Record hours per pass: automated, keyboard, screen reader, visual, structural. Then report writing separately.
- Multiply by your existing rate. If you already bill development at a day rate, use it. An audit is not a different profession requiring a different economy.
- Add 25–30% for the first few. You will be slower than you expect, and the report will take longer than the testing. This is not padding; it is the actual cost of doing it properly.
- Sanity-check against the table above. If your number lands far below the published floor, you are either much faster than the market or you have under-scoped. It is almost always the second one.
A realistic first-audit shape for five templates: 2–3 days of testing and reporting. Whatever three of your days cost is your price. That is the whole calculation.
Structure the quote in three tiers
Never send a single price. A single price invites negotiation about the price. Three prices invite a decision about scope, which is a conversation you win.
| Tier | Scope | Rough effort |
|---|---|---|
| Essential | 5 templates; automated, keyboard and visual passes; report and statement draft | 2–3 days |
| Standard | 10 templates; adds screen reader testing and a remediation plan | 4–6 days |
| Comprehensive | 16 templates including full checkout and account, plus documents and support review | 8–12 days |
Most buyers take the middle option. That is the one to design carefully.
The two line items people forget
Retesting
Price it separately, and put it in the original proposal — typically 20–30% of the audit fee. It is the cheapest work you will ever do, because scope, method and evidence already exist, and it is what converts a one-off audit into a sequence. If you do not mention it upfront, asking for it later sounds like an upsell. Mentioned upfront, it sounds like process.
The retainer
Quarterly regression testing, statement upkeep, a few advisory hours. Offer it even when nobody takes it. Accessibility decays with every release, and the client who declined a retainer in March frequently asks for one in October after a redesign breaks something. The offer costs you a paragraph.
Five pricing mistakes
- Quoting before scoping. "How much for an accessibility audit?" has no answer until you know how many templates and whether checkout is included. Ask first, always.
- Including remediation in the audit price. These are different engagements with different risk. Audit tells you what is wrong; fixing it is separate work, separately priced.
- Absorbing scope creep. "Could you also check these other 200 pages" is a change order. It only works if the original scope was written down as a numbered list.
- Competing with overlay widgets on price. You cannot, and you should not try. A widget costs a few hundred a year; an audit is a professional service. Different product, different buyer, different conversation.
- Guaranteeing outcomes. Never promise compliance, a passing grade, or protection from legal action. Promise the testing and the deliverables, which are the things you control.
If the bottleneck is method rather than price
Most people asking what to charge are really asking whether they can deliver something worth charging for.
Conformant is the manual audit method written down: 61 test procedures covering all 55 WCAG 2.2 Level A/AA success criteria plus the EN 301 549 clauses that go beyond WCAG, a self-scoring workbook, and the client-facing report, remediation plan, accessibility statement and proposal templates — including the three-tier structure described above. One-time purchase.
Or read the worked example — a real audit of a major retailer, including the four false findings the automated pass produced.
Sources
- Accessible.org — accessibility services pricing
- DigitalA11Y — web accessibility audit cost guide
- AudioEye — audit cost, pricing examples
- Accessibility Base — consultant hourly rates
- Kris Rivenburgh — VPAT cost
All are vendor- or practitioner-published rather than independent survey data. Figures accurate as published in 2026; rates move, and they vary sharply by country.