Carbon Design System

Design annotations are needed for specific instances shown below, but for the standard menu button, combo button, and overflow menu, Carbon already incorporates accessibility.

What Carbon provides
Design recommendations
Development considerations

What Carbon provides

Carbon bakes keyboard operation into its components, improving the experience of blind users and others who operate via keyboard. Carbon also incorporates other accessibility considerations, some of which are described below.

Keyboard interaction

Menu button

The menu button is set in the tab order and is activated by

Space

Enter

. When the menu is open, the first item takes focus. Focus is moved between menu items with the

Up

and

Down

arrow keys.

Space

Enter

activates the item with focus, which causes focus to go somewhere else and the menu to close.

Esc

collapses the menu and puts focus back onto the menu button.

example of menu button keyboard interaction

Menu button is reached by Tab. Space and Enter keys open the menu as well as activating menu items with focus.

illustration showing an open menu with the focus on the first item, and the arrow and Esc keys called out

When opened, the first item in the menu takes focus. Arrow keys move focus and Esc closes the menu.

Combo button

The combo button is set in the tab order where the first tab brings focus on the primary button and the second tab brings focus on the icon button that contains the menu. The respective buttons are activated by

Space

Enter

. When the menu is open, the first item takes focus. Focus is moved between menu items with the

Up

and

Down

arrow keys.

Space

Enter

activates the item with focus, which causes focus to go somewhere else and the menu to close.

Esc

collapses the menu and puts focus back onto the icon button.

example of combo button keyboard interaction

Combo button items are reached by two Tab stops. Space and Enter keys open the menu as well as activating menu items with focus.

When opened, the first item in the menu takes focus. Arrow keys move focus and Esc closes the menu.

Overflow menu

Each overflow menu is in the tab order and is activated by

Space

Enter

. When the menu is open, the first item takes focus. Focus is moved between menu items with the

Up

and

Down

arrow keys.

Space

Enter

activates the item with focus, which causes focus to go somewhere else and the menu to close.

Esc

collapses the menu and puts focus onto the menu button.

example of overflow menu keyboard interaction

Overflow menus are reached by Tab. Space and Enter keys open the menu as well as activating menu items with focus.

When opened, the first item in the menu takes focus. Arrow keys move focus and Esc closes the menu.

Design recommendations

Design annotations are needed for the following instances.

Labeling

Combo button

Combo button has a prop that can be used to change the tooltip label and is only intended to be changed to translate “Additional actions” into other languages. If translation is required, the translation must be annotated with a label that is exposed on hover or focus.

Annotate the label for combo button so the proper tooltip appears, which should only be used for translation purposes.

Overflow menu

Overflow menu’s custom icon variant has a prop that can be used to change the tooltip label. If the tooltip label is changed, they must be annotated with a label that will be exposed on hover or focus.

Annotate the label for overflow menu’s custom icon variant so the proper tooltip appears.

Development considerations

Keep these considerations in mind if you are modifying Carbon or creating a custom component.

Menu button, combo button, and the overflow menu are buttons with
```
aria-haspopup
```
set to “true”.
The menu button, combo button, and the overflow menu is named with
```
aria-label
```
.
Each menu item across menu button, combo button, and overflow menu is an
```
li
```
in a
```
ul
```
.
Each list item across menu button, combo button, and overflow menu contains a button with
```
role="menuitem"
```
and
```
tabindex="-1"
```
. See the ARIA authoring practices on menubutton for more considerations.
Combo button and overflow menu has an
```
iconDescription
```
prop that can be used to change the tooltip label. See the design recommendations for more guidelines on tooltip labels.
For combo button, the menu is given an
```
id
```
. When the menu is open, the icon button is given
```
aria-controls
```
with a value of the menu
```
id
```
.
```
aria-expanded
```
is also set based on the open state.
When the combo button menu is open, the element (
```
div
```
) wrapping the entire combo button is given
```
aria-owns
```
with a value of the menu
```
id
```
.

Accessibility testing status
For every latest release, Carbon runs tests on all components to meet the accessibility requirements. These different statuses report the work that Carbon has done in the back end. These tests appear only when the components are stable.

Latest version: | Framework: React (@carbon/react)

Component	Accessibility test	Status	Link to source code
Menu buttons	Test(s) that ensure the initial render state of a component is accessible.	Automated or manual testing has been temporarily deferred.	GitHub link
	Tests that ensure additional states of the component are accessible. This could be interactive states of a component or its multiple variants.	Automated or manual testing has been temporarily deferred.
	Tests that ensure focus is properly managed, and all interactive functions of a component have a proper keyboard-accessible equivalent.	Test data is either not available or not applicable for this component state.
	This manual testing ensures that the visual information on the screen is properly conveyed and read correctly by screen readers such as JAWS, VoiceOver, and NVDA.	A human has manually tested this component, e.g. screen reader testing.

Menu buttons

What Carbon provides

Keyboard interaction

Menu button

Combo button

Overflow menu

Design recommendations

Labeling

Combo button

Overflow menu

Development considerations

Accessibility testing statusFor every latest release, Carbon runs tests on all components to meet the accessibility requirements. These different statuses report the work that Carbon has done in the back end. These tests appear only when the components are stable.

Accessibility testing status
For every latest release, Carbon runs tests on all components to meet the accessibility requirements. These different statuses report the work that Carbon has done in the back end. These tests appear only when the components are stable.