Color Contrast Analyzer

Color Contrast Analyzer

Analyze a web page or portion of a web page for conformance with WCAG 2.0 Color Contrast requirements.

What is Color Contrast Analyzer?
Color Contrast Analyzer is a user-friendly Chrome extension. It checks the contrast of text colors on a web page to ensure compliance with WCAG 2.0 standards. This tool is capable of analyzing entire pages or selected portions, including advanced CSS features and gradients. It also supports AA or AAA conformance evaluations and offers a custom text size selection tool. Downloadable image analysis is provided for record-keeping purposes.
Merlin
Stats
Users: 80,000+
Rating: 3.31 (64)
Version: 1.1.2 (Last updated: 2014-08-25)
Creation date: 2014-08-25
Risk impact: High risk impact
Risk likelihood: Low risk likelihood
Manifest version: 2
Permissions:
  • tabs
  • http://*/*
  • https://*/*
  • <all_urls>
  • storage
Size: 59.67K
URLs: Website
Stats date:

Other platforms

Not available on Firefox
Not available on Edge
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Merlin
Summary

New in version 1.1: Download the image analysis to a PNG file.

This extension allows you to analyze text color contrast problems on a webpage according to the WCAG 2 text color contrast requirements. It evaluates the page as it appears in the browser, so it is able to handle text over gradients and advanced CSS attributes. You can choose to analyze a portion of a web page, the entire visible contents of a tab, or an entire web page.

Additionally, you can evaluate files on your computer that can be opened in Chrome, such as image files and PDF files. Note, with PDF files you will only be able to evaluate the visible portion of the page. To analyze local files you will need to go to your Extensions page and check "Allow access to file URLs" for this extension.

You can select to evaluate for either AA or AAA conformance, along with specifying the size of the text you want to analyze.

The output will show you a map of where the edges between colors are different enough to meet the specified contrast requirement. If there is an item on the underlying page that is not outlined in the output mask, then the item does not have enough color contrast according to the conformance level you selected. The resulting image analysis can be downloaded to your computer as a PNG file.

In order to better handle gradients, you can also select the pixel radius that should be used to analyze adjacent pixels. The larger the pixel radius, the further out it will look for a border with high enough contrast. However, a larger pixel radius will add significant computation time.

When first installing the extension, you may need to refresh the webpage you wish to analyze for all of the selection options to be available.

Also, when installing the extension it will ask you for permission to access your data on all of your websites and your tabs and browsing activity. We are not using or collecting this data in any way. In order to get permission to take screenshots of your browser window this is the level of access we must request. You can view the source code at the following URL.

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User reviews
User reviews summary
These summaries are automatically generated weekly using AI based on recent user reviews. Chrome Web Store does not verify user reviews, so some user reviews may be inaccurate, spammy, or outdated.
Pros
  • Useful tool for detecting text-over-background-image contrast levels
  • Has the ability to select WCAG levels
  • Relevant addition to other accessibility tools
Cons
  • Frequent crashes
  • Unable to scan entire page
  • Causes console errors
  • Displays issues with wide monitor selection
  • Not updated to current standards
Most mentioned
  • Crashes and instability issues
  • Console errors
  • Outdated standards
Recent reviews
Makes it easy to spot places in your page where the color contrast needs increased. However, there presently is a bug where you can only re-analyze on one browser tab at a time.

Page region: on a wide monitor only the top of the page is selectable. I cannot drag the rectanlge to the botton of the page.
by György Raffay György Raffay, 2023-11-27

Quite useful, works for me, a bit slow though.
by Sergio X Sergio X, 2023-10-10
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Safety
Risk impact

Color Contrast Analyzer is risky to use as it requires a number of sensitive permissions that can potentially harm your browser and steal your data. Exercise caution when installing this extension. Review carefully before installing. We recommend that you only install Color Contrast Analyzer if you trust the publisher.

Risk likelihood

Color Contrast Analyzer has earned a fairly good reputation and likely can be trusted.

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Promo video
Screenshots
Promo images
Color Contrast Analyzer small promo image
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