TikTok introduced three new accessibility-focused options on Thursday. The brand new options had been introduced on the event of the International Accessibility Consciousness Day, which falls on the third Thursday in Might (this 12 months, it’s on Might 15). One of many new options is an replace to the choice textual content (alt textual content) assist, which now makes use of synthetic intelligence (AI) to generate automated descriptive captions. Different accessibility options embrace a brand new excessive distinction mode and assist for daring textual content. Notably, earlier this week, the corporate launched a brand new image-to-video era software.
TikTok Brings Three New Accessibility Options
In a newsroom submit, the video-focused social media platform detailed the three new accessibility options it was introducing for customers. These options will be part of the platform’s present accessibility instruments, corresponding to auto-generated captions for movies, darkish mode, text-to-speech, and thumbnail animation.
The primary new function is AI-generated alt textual content. TikTok added alt textual content for picture posts a number of weeks in the past. Customers may manually add a caption describing the picture, and it might be learn out loud by display screen readers. Now, it’s constructing on the function by utilizing AI to generate descriptive captions for photographs that would not have alt textual content. The corporate says it will enhance usability for people who find themselves blind, have low imaginative and prescient, or course of content material in a different way.
Subsequent is an choice to extend color distinction on the platform. TikTok is introducing a excessive distinction mode that will increase the foreground color of textual content, icons, and person interface components. This function will be discovered within the Accessibility choice inside Settings, marked as Improve color distinction. TikTok says it will make the platform extra user-friendly for people with low imaginative and prescient or these delicate to low distinction.
Lastly, the platform can be including assist for the daring textual content setting in units. If a tool has set the textual content setting to daring, they’ll now see all in-app textual content, together with names, feedback, captions, and messages in daring as effectively. This can enhance readability for customers preferring bolder textual content or have imaginative and prescient points. All of those new options at the moment are obtainable for all customers with the newest replace.
