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Good practice Imported

Portugal's Selo de Usabilidade e Acessibilidade — Gold Tier Requires Testing with Disabled Users

Portugal · Lisbon · See the Portugal profile · See the Lisbon profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 55% 72/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Portugal's tiered Bronze-Silver-Gold accessibility seal, run by AMA and INR, requires Gold applicants to usability-test sites and apps with people with disabilities and prove fixes were made. Seals doubled 2022–2024, but under 10% of declared sites hold one.

16 → 38 count
Seals held (Bronze/Silver/Gold combined) (Dec 2022–Dec 2024)
<10 %
Public bodies with a seal, among those publishing an accessibility declaration (2024)
Portugal's Selo de Usabilidade e Acessibilidade — Gold Tier Requires Testing with Disabled Users

Details

Maturity
Scaling
Promoter
Agência para a Modernização Administrativa (AMA) & Instituto Nacional para a Reabilitação (INR)
Period
2022–ongoing
Region (NUTS)
PT17
Keywords
digital government, accessibility certification, usability testing

Context

Since 2022, Portugal's Agência para a Modernização Administrativa (AMA) and the Instituto Nacional para a Reabilitação (INR) have run a three-tier public-sector certification — Bronze, Silver and Gold — built on top of the country's WCAG-based accessibility obligations under Decree-Law 83/2018.

Objectives

The scheme aims to push public bodies beyond minimum legal compliance toward verified, user-tested accessibility, with a government target of 90% of Portuguese public websites holding the seal by the end of 2026.

Activities

Only the Gold tier requires direct evidence of inclusive design: applicants must commission usability tests with real users — explicitly including people with disabilities or incapacity — document the findings in a report, and show that every recommendation was implemented before the seal is granted. Municipalities such as Valongo and the CIM Região de Aveiro intermunicipal community were among the first to reach Gold, by July 2024.

Results

The number of seals held roughly doubled from 16 to 38 between December 2022 and December 2024, while the number of published accessibility declarations quintupled over the same period. Fewer than 10% of public bodies that publish an accessibility declaration go on to seek the seal.

Conclusions

The gap between the growing number of declarations and the still-small number of seals — and the distance from the 2026 target — illustrates both the promise and the limits of a voluntary certification layered on top of a legal mandate.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k) — No published budget figures; band reflects the ongoing cost of running third-party usability testing and a national certification body across the public sector.
Time to results
Medium (1–3 years) — Scheme launched 2022, with a national adoption target of 2026 — band reflects a multi-year national rollout.
Staffing & skills
Run jointly by the Agência para a Modernização Administrativa (AMA) and the Instituto Nacional para a Reabilitação (INR), Gold-tier applicants must commission independent usability testing with real users, including people with disabilities

Conditions for success

  • Usability testing findings must be documented in a report
  • Every recommendation from the usability report must be implemented before the Gold seal is granted

Common failure modes

  • Fewer than 10% of public bodies that publish an accessibility declaration go on to seek any tier of the seal
  • Adoption is running far behind the government's 2026 target of 90% of public websites holding the seal

Where it fits

Governance type
national government agencies with voluntary adoption by municipalities
Scale
national

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

Attachments

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