Turn on Chromebook accessibility features

You can make your Chromebook easier to use when you turn on accessibility features that work best for your needs.

Step 1: Find accessibility features

1. On your computer:
   • At the bottom right, select the time.
   • Press Alt + Shift + s.
2. Select Settings Accessibility.
   • Optional: To have quick access to accessibility features, turn on Always show accessibility options in the system menu.

Step 2: Turn on a feature

Choose the accessibility features that you'd like to use:

• Text-to-speech: Turn on the screen reader or Select to Speak.
• Type text with your voice: Turn on dictation.
• Display and magnification: Turn on:
  • Colour correction: Colour filters for protanopia, deuteranopia or tritanopia, or set the display to greyscale. You can adjust the filter intensity.
  • Colour inversion: Screens change from light to dark and vice versa.
  • Full-screen magnifier: Use to enlarge items on the screen.
  • Docked magnifier: To find screen magnification, use a split screen.
  • Reduced animations: Limit on-screen movement.
  • Display settings: To make items on your screen smaller or larger, change the display size.
  • Website text size and font: Customise text size and font for the web browser.
• Keyboard and text input: Turn on:
  • On-screen keyboard: Use the on-screen keyboard.
  • Dictation: Type with your voice.
  • Switch Access: Control your device with one or more switches.
  • Sticky keys: Turn on Chromebook accessibility features.
  • Highlight item with keyboard focus: Item is highlighted when you move focus.
  • Highlight text cursor: Cursor is highlighted when it appears or moves.
  • Text cursor blink rate: Adjust the text blink rate to fast or don’t blink.
  • Navigate with text cursor or caret browsing: Use the arrow keys to move through items letter by letter.
  • Bounce keys: Adjust the delay time between repeated keystrokes.
  • Slow keys: Adjust the delay time to allow all keystrokes.
• Mouse and touchpad: Turn on navigation buttons in tablet mode, automatic clicking, tap dragging, cursor highlighting, or change the cursor's size or colour.
• Audio: Play all sounds together through all speakers or play sound on startup.
• Chrome Live Caption: Turn on Chrome Live Captions for media played on your Chrome Browser.

Tap and drag your finger to move objects

1. At the bottom right, select the time.
   • Or press Alt + Shift + s.
2. Select Settings Accessibility Cursor and touchpad.
3. Select Open mouse and touchpad device settings.
4. To move an item, double-tap it and hold, then drag.

To use tap-to-select, double-tap it and hold, then drag it to move.

Use keyboard shortcuts one key at a time

1. At the bottom right, select the time.
   • Or press Alt + Shift + s.
2. Select Settings Accessibility.
3. To enter keyboard shortcuts sequentially, under 'Keyboard and text input', turn on Sticky keys.

To use sticky keys, press Search , Launcher , Shift, Alt or Ctrl, whichever key starts the keyboard shortcut.

• To keep a key pressed until you finish the keyboard shortcut, press the key twice.
• To unpress a key, press it a third time.

Use buttons to navigate in tablet mode

You can use buttons instead of gestures to switch between apps and interact with your Chromebook in tablet mode. Learn how to change from laptop to tablet mode.

1. At the bottom right, select the time.
   • Or press Alt + Shift + s.
2. Select Settings   Accessibility  Cursor and touchpad.
3. Turn on Show navigation buttons.
4. At the bottom, the buttons will appear.
   • To go back to the previous screen, at the bottom left, select Back .
   • To go to your home screen, at the bottom left, select the Launcher . Or press Alt + Shift + L.
   • To view all your open app windows, on the bottom right, select Show windows .

Swipe to navigate between pages

To turn on swipe gesture:

1. At the bottom right, select the time.
   • Or press Alt + Shift + s.
2. Select Settings Accessibility Cursor and touchpad.
3. Turn on Use a swipe gesture to navigate between pages.

Tip: If you scroll over a page, it turns the page back. To turn this off, turn on Use a swipe gesture to navigate between pages.

Sync your accessibility settings

Your accessibility settings can now sync across Chromebook devices when you sign in to your Google Account. This saves your settings so that you don't need to set them up again on a new device or after a powerwash.

Manage which accessibility settings sync

1. At the bottom right, select the time.
2. Select Settings .
3. Under 'Privacy and security', select Sync and Google services.
4. Select Manage what you sync.
5. Choose what you’d like to sync.
   • To use all the same settings on every Chromebook that you sign in to, turn on Sync everything.
   • To choose specific settings to sync on each Chromebook that you sign in to:
     1. Turn on Customise sync.
     2. Under 'Sync data', turn on Settings.
        • This includes your accessibility preferences.

Get more help

For more Accessibility help, contact the Disability Support team.