Making PDF tables accessible

A table is only accessible if a screen reader can associate each cell with its headers. Visually bold text is not enough — the structure must be real.

Header cells, not bold text

Mark the top row and any row labels as header cells so readers can announce "Revenue, Q1: 40,000" instead of a stream of numbers.

Keep tables simple

Avoid merged cells and nested tables where possible; simple grids are far easier to make accessible.

Layout tables are different

If you used a table only for visual layout, it should not be tagged as a data table at all.