What a Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) Is and Who Asks for One
A VPAT is a template that vendors complete to report how a product meets accessibility standards. This post covers what it contains, who asks for it, and what an honest one looks like.
Updated with additional research.
A business that sells to government agencies, educational institutions or large enterprises may receive a procurement request it has not seen before: a request for a VPAT, short for Voluntary Product Accessibility Template.
The term is technical, the format is unfamiliar, and the request often arrives with little context. This post covers what the document is and what it contains.
What a VPAT Is
The VPAT is a free template published by the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI). It turns accessibility standards, such as Section 508 and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), into criteria that a vendor tests a product against and documents.
The owner of the product completes it. ITI states that manufacturers or vendors declare the degree of conformance, and ITI does not review or certify the result. The report is self-reported. A buyer may ask for third-party review in a solicitation, but the template itself does not require it.
A completed VPAT is called an Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR). The VPAT is the template and the ACR is the finished report for a specific product. The two terms are often used interchangeably, which adds to the confusion.
The Current Editions
ITI publishes several editions, all at version 2.5Rev as of its current page. The 508 edition covers Revised Section 508, which incorporates WCAG 2.0. The EU edition covers EN 301 549, which includes WCAG 2.1. The WCAG edition covers WCAG 2.2. The INT edition combines all three.
Which edition to use depends on what the buyer asks for. A federal buyer may ask for the 508 edition, and an organization that follows WCAG 2.2 directly may ask for that one.
Who Asks for VPATs
Federal agencies are the clearest case. Section 508 applies to federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain or use information and communication technology. Section508.gov recommends that vendors generate an ACR for the federal market, and says agencies use ACRs in market research and evaluation. That wording is a recommendation to vendors and a description of how agencies use the reports. It does not state that every contract requires one.
Colleges and universities are covered by the ADA, and public institutions may also follow state accessibility policies. Some state governments have their own technology accessibility policies as well, which differ from state to state.
Accessibility questions are increasingly part of vendor review at large organizations, particularly in regulated industries such as financial services and healthcare.
Not every business needs a VPAT. A small service business that does not sell to government or large institutional buyers is unlikely to receive such a request. The businesses that need to understand the document are the ones selling, or aiming to sell, into those procurement settings.
What a VPAT Contains
The template has a row for each criterion in the standard being reported. For each row, the vendor records a conformance level and a detailed explanation. The editions also ask for a product description and for the evaluation methods used, so a buyer can judge how the results were reached.
The conformance levels are Supports, Partially Supports, Does Not Support and Not Applicable. Partially Supports means the product meets the criterion in some respects but not all. Does Not Support means it does not meet the criterion. Not Applicable means the criterion does not apply to the product.
A completed report is a criterion-by-criterion disclosure. It is not a pass or fail checklist. Its purpose is to give a procurement team enough detail to judge, before signing, whether the product will work for its users with disabilities.
Why “We Are Accessible” Is Not a VPAT
A general statement that a product is accessible does not replace a VPAT where one is requested. Procurement teams asking for one want criterion-level documentation.
A reply such as “our platform is WCAG 2.2 AA compliant” with nothing behind it prompts questions. How was it evaluated, and by whom? When? Which criteria were tested, and what were the partial findings?
The format exists because “we are accessible” cannot be checked. The report forces specifics about what was tested, what was found and where the gaps are.
The Honesty Question
A VPAT that claims full support on every criterion draws skepticism from experienced reviewers. Evaluations usually surface findings. For context, the 2026 WebAIM Million found detectable WCAG failures on 95.9% of one million home pages using automated testing alone. That sample was home pages in general, not products evaluated for a VPAT, but it shows how common failures are.
A report with partial conformance entries, accurate explanations, notes on how known gaps are being handled and a description of the evaluation process is easier to trust than a perfect-looking one.
Producing a VPAT
Writing a credible VPAT starts with an accessibility evaluation. The report records the evaluation, and it cannot be filled in without one.
The evaluation should cover the scope the buyer will assess, including the full user journey, interactive features, forms, navigation and dynamic content. It should combine manual testing with automated tools. Deque, an accessibility software vendor, found automated testing detected issues for 16 of the 50 WCAG 2.1 Level AA criteria in its analysis of more than 13,000 page states, so automation alone leaves most criteria without evidence for a criterion-level disclosure.
The Small Business Owner’s Guide to Website Accessibility covers how WCAG, Section 508 and the ADA relate for small businesses.
COREaccess™ includes accessibility audits and ACR and VPAT preparation. If a VPAT request has arrived and you are unsure where to start, a 15-minute conversation is a practical first step.