Loupe

Loupe is a browser extension that scans web pages for accessibility issues and explains how to fix them in plain language that doesn't require deep expertise in WCAG specifications. It's built on axe-core, the same engine that powers most professional accessibility testing tools, but wraps it in an interface designed for people who need results they can act on immediately without first becoming accessibility experts themselves. The combination of industry-standard detection with human-readable output makes it practical for a wider range of users than typical developer-focused tools.

The core function runs entirely in your browser with no data uploaded to external servers. When you scan a page, Loupe highlights the problematic elements directly on screen, grouped by severity so you can prioritize what to fix first. That in-context highlighting means you see exactly which elements have issues rather than interpreting a list of selectors and trying to map them back to the visual page. The privacy guarantee matters if you're working on client sites under NDA or internal projects with sensitive content that can't leave your machine. The scan results stay local, and the extension works offline once installed.

What separates Loupe from raw axe-core output or similar developer tools is the explanation layer. Each issue comes with a plain-English description of what's wrong, why it matters for users with disabilities, and what needs to change. For developers, there are AI-drafted code fix suggestions that show exactly what to modify in the markup. These aren't meant to be copied blindly. They're starting points that need review and testing. But they cut down the time between identifying a problem and understanding how to resolve it, which is often the slowest part of accessibility remediation for teams that don't do it constantly.

The free tier gives you unlimited scans, in-context highlighting, and those plain-English explanations without any restrictions on volume. You can audit as many pages as you want without signing up for anything or providing payment information. The Pro tier at nineteen dollars per month (or one hundred ninety per year for a small discount) adds white-label PDF reports, multi-page crawls that can scan up to eight pages simultaneously, and saved project management for tracking multiple clients over time. If you're an agency delivering accessibility audits as a service, the reporting features turn Loupe into something you can build a client deliverable around rather than just a diagnostic tool for internal use.

The reports themselves are designed to be understandable by non-technical stakeholders who need to approve budgets and prioritize fixes. They avoid dense WCAG jargon in favor of language that explains what needs to happen and why it matters in terms anyone can understand. That's a meaningful differentiator if you've ever tried to hand a raw accessibility audit to a client or manager and watched their eyes glaze over as they tried to parse technical specifications they weren't trained to read. The white-label option lets you brand reports with your own identity, which matters for agencies that want to present audits as their own work rather than as output from a third-party tool.

Beyond the extension, Loupe offers a standalone color contrast checker that tests against WCAG AA and AAA standards, plus a quick page scan tool that works without any installation. Those free utilities make it easy to try the approach before committing to the extension or to check contrast ratios quickly without leaving your design tool. The contrast checker is useful even if you never use the full extension, which makes it a good entry point for people exploring whether accessibility tooling fits their workflow.

The target audience spans solo developers who want to catch issues before they ship, agencies building accessibility into their service offerings as a premium add-on, and organizations concerned about compliance with regulations like the ADA in the United States or the European Accessibility Act in the EU. Accessibility lawsuits have become more common in recent years, and tools like Loupe lower the barrier to finding and fixing problems before they become legal exposure or damage to reputation. The extension is available through the Chrome Web Store. It doesn't require an account for basic functionality, and the privacy-first approach means you can run it on sensitive projects without worrying about where the data goes.