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Google's stance on using display:none for accessibility reasons

Jake Mates [PersonRank 1]

Monday, October 20, 2008
15 years ago2,699 views

I was wondering – does Google have an official stance on using display:none to hide accessibility links? I want to add a link to skip navigation and go straight to the content. I would use CSS (display:none) to hide it, so that while most users could not see it, screen readers could speak it. Google is not okay with hiding text for spamming, but are they okay with hiding text for one accessibility link?

TOMHTML [PersonRank 10]

15 years ago #

"Hiding text or links in your content can cause your site to be perceived as untrustworthy since it presents information to search engines differently than to visitors."
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66353

Jake Mates [PersonRank 1]

15 years ago #

I understand – but I am not trying to serve spam keywords to Google. I am trying to enhance the user experience for people using screen readers. Will I get penalized by Google for hiding one link (three words)? I am only hiding it because there is no good way to present the link within the page.

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

15 years ago #

Many sites, including this one, hide certain layers via stylesheets for this or that reason. For instance, I'm hiding the navigation above behind a (visible) "more" button. I can't say I've ever been penalized for that. Google's guidelines say you should ask yourself "Are any text or links there solely for search engines rather than visitors?"

ChiChi [PersonRank 0]

15 years ago #

Actually, display: none isn't read by most screen readers (see http://www.alistapart.com/articles/fir#results).

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