Accessible video player

What can the player do?
Our player offers: keyboard access, shortcut keys, screen reader access, styled captions, audio description support, user-defined text size and user-defined text colour and contrast.

What file types does the player work with?
FLV, MP4 and MP3.

Does the player support RTMP streaming?
Not yet, we hope to add this feature soon.

Is there an HTML5 version of the player?
Not yet, but it does include a HTML5 fallback version for platforms/browsers that don’t support Flash. The fallback version does not have the accessibility features of the Flash version. We intend to create a truly accessible HTML5 player when the technology allows.

What browsers is the player accessible in?
All features work fully in Internet Explorer (IE), the only current browser that supports screen readers and Flash together. Keyboard accessibility works fully in IE and Firefox, but other browsers don’t let the user tab from the page to the player and out again. In Chrome and Safari, the user needs to first click on the player with the mouse to use keyboard controls.

Has the player been tested?
We worked with Shaw Trust to test our player using SuperNova, ZoomText, JAWS and Dragon Naturally Speaking. It’s been tested by switch access and keyboard-only users, people with readability issues, and by users who are deaf/hard of hearing, or who have learning difficulties.

What is the video player license?
The Accessible Video Player by The Workshop is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Note: There is an issue with Chrome and the latest Flash player (11.2). We will release an update soon.