Dote should work for every couple, however you see, hear, move or read. This page says what works today in the app and on dote.day, what we know isn’t right yet, and how to tell us when something gets in your way.
What we’re aiming for
We’re working towards the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 at level AA, in the app and on this website. That’s our goal, not a claim that we meet every part of it yet. Dote is made by one person in Scotland, so we fix things in the open and say plainly what’s still to do.
In the app
Dote follows the accessibility settings on your iPhone or Android phone. You don’t need to switch anything on inside Dote.
- Dark mode. Dote follows your phone’s light or dark setting, and changes over straight away when you switch.
- Larger text. Text grows with Larger Text (Dynamic Type) on iPhone and Font size on Android, up to the very largest sizes. At big sizes, screens scroll instead of cutting things off, cards stack their picture above the words, and long titles, places and dates wrap instead of trailing off with “…”.
- Reduce Motion. With Reduce Motion (iPhone) or Remove animations (Android) on, there’s no confetti, the pull-to-refresh heart doesn’t beat, and screens fade instead of sliding.
- Increase Contrast. With Increase Contrast (iPhone) or High contrast text (Android) on, borders and quieter text get stronger. Text boxes, switches and chips always have an edge you can see, and we don’t lean on colour alone to show what’s selected or loved.
- VoiceOver and TalkBack. Every button has a name and says what it does. Idea and memory cards read as one item, with Love, Plan it and Open as actions. Errors, “saved” messages and Undo are read out, and Undo waits longer while a screen reader is on.
- Voice Control. Buttons answer to the words you can see on them, so “Tap Plan it” or “Tap Add to calendar” works. Heart ratings can be tapped by voice too (“Tap 4 hearts”).
- A reading font. There’s a reading font setting in Settings, under Text & display, where you can swap Dote’s fonts for OpenDyslexic, Atkinson Hyperlegible or your phone’s own font.
We’ve been through every screen in the code for each of these, and automatic checks on every change stop the basics slipping (buttons without names, announcements that iPhone wouldn’t read out, tap targets that are too small, screens that don’t scroll at the largest text sizes, colours that are too faint). We’re still running every common task (signing in, pairing up, saving, planning, memories, Premium and Settings) with each setting on real iPhones and Android phones, and we’ll fix what that turns up.
On dote.day
- A “Skip to content” link is the first thing you reach with the keyboard.
- Every link and button shows a clear focus ring when you move around with the keyboard.
- Out of the box, the site follows your browser and device settings: text size and zoom, light or dark, contrast and reduce motion. There’s nothing you need to switch on.
- Display settings. If you’d like something different on this site, the “Display” button at the top of every page (marked “Aa”; on phones, just “Aa”) opens display settings, and the “Display settings” link at the bottom of every page opens them too. You can choose a reading font (Dote, OpenDyslexic, Atkinson Hyperlegible or your device’s own font), light or dark whatever your device is set to, more contrast, less motion, underlined links and roomier text (wider spacing between letters, words, lines and paragraphs). Each one starts on “Match device” or “Off”, changes the page straight away, and is remembered on this device only. They work with a keyboard and screen readers, and Esc closes them; keyboard users can also reach them from a second skip link, “Display settings”. They need JavaScript: without it, the site follows your browser. Text size and zoom stay with your browser, which does them well.
- Photos that are the point of a page, like the ones on a shared memory, have a description. Decorative pictures are hidden from screen readers.
- Heart ratings and invite codes are read out as words (“4 hearts out of 5”, and codes letter by letter) rather than as symbols or a made-up word.
- The waitlist form’s email box is labelled, and if something goes wrong, the message is tied to the box so screen readers hear it.
- Pages work without JavaScript.
- Every change to the site is checked automatically with axe, an accessibility testing tool, before it goes live. It catches things like missing labels, names and headings, not everything, so we still check by hand too.
What we know isn’t right yet
- Real-device checks. Until we’ve finished them, some things may not behave on a real phone the way the code says they should. If you hit one, please tell us.
Tell us what’s not working
If anything in Dote or on dote.day is hard to use, or you’d like something from this site in another format (plain text, large print or something else), email hello@dote.day. A real person reads every message, and we’ll aim to get back to you within a few days.
It helps to tell us what you were trying to do, which phone or browser you were using, and any setting you had switched on. No need to be technical about it.
If you’re not happy with our reply
We want to sort it out with you directly, so please email us first. If you’re in the UK and feel we haven’t made a reasonable adjustment, the Equality Advisory and Support Service (equalityadvisoryservice.com) can advise you, free.
About this page
We last checked this page against the app and the site on 27 September 2026. We’ll update it as we fix things, and whenever something here changes.