Accessibility features are just features

Apple is bringing an accessibility feature that helps prevent motion sickness to iOS 18 later this year. When turned on, Vehicle Motion Cues adds animated dots that flow across your screen in the opposite direction of your motion while using your device in a moving vehicle. Turn left, dots move to the right. Or as Apple puts it, "animated dots on the edges of the screen represent changes in vehicle motion to help reduce sensory conflict without interfering with the main content."

This type of accessibility feature is also a good reminder that accessibility features are really just "features".

Maybe you sprained your wrist and need to control your device with your only voice for a few days. Maybe you ran out of your daily contacts and need to bump that text size up 200% for a little while. Or you're just in your mid 40s now (glance glance) and need that size up a few notches all the time. These types of features improve the experience for all users, regardless of any specific ability or impairment.

It should not be hard to justify the investment in creating accessible experiences, but even when companies are legally required to do so sometimes fighting for the needed time and money can still be an uphill battle. Being able to tell compelling stories and bring in examples from industry leaders like Apple to explain the broad impact of accessible experiences can be a big help in those conversations.

As someone extremely prone to motion sickness, I'm eager to try this out personally when the iOS 18 betas come out this summer. Maybe I'll even be able to let my wife drive once in a while on this summer's family road trip.

More info available on Vehicle Motion Cues and all of iOS 18's pre-announced accessibility features on Apple's Newsroom: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/05/apple-announces-new-accessibility-features-including-eye-tracking/