Question

TinyMCE is compatible with screen readers such as JAWS and NVDA as it follows the WAI-ARIA specification. Use NVDA together with Firefox for the best Accessibility experience.

Keyboard shortcuts

The Alt+key shortcut assumes that you are currently in the content area of the editor.

Alt Key	Result
Alt + F9	Focus/jump to menu bar
Alt + F10	Focus/jump to toolbar
Alt + F11	Focus/jump to element path
Esc	Close menu/submenu/dialog (also gets you back to editor area)
Tab/Arrow	Navigate left/right through menu/toolbar

How to work with the editor

The content area has initial focus when you navigate into an editor instance. Up Arrow and Down Arrow gives you paragraphs, headings and other items such as links. Note that NVDA and Firefox treat links as embedded characters, you have actually to navigate into them to read their texts, but they are accessible.

Press Alt+F9 to move focus to the menu bar. Left Arrow and Right Arrow navigates through the top menu items. Down Arrow opens the menu. Press Esc once to go back to the top level. Right Arrow on a submenu navigate into them while Esc backs out.

Alternatively, press Alt+F10 to focus on the toolbars. The first toolbar has focus and you can Tab or arrow through the items. Submenu items and panels are opened with Down Arrow and closed with Esc. When you reach the end of one toolbar the Right Arrow and Left Arrow wrap to the next and previous toolbars respectively. Esc brings you back into the central content area.

Dialogs such as Insert/Edit or Image/Video are opened from either the menus or the toolbars. These are multi-page dialogs with at least two tabs at the top. The Right Arrow and Left Arrow moves between the tabs in the tab list. Space makes the current tab active. Tab moves into the panel and through the controls. Save accepts changes, Esc or Cancel discards changes.

You can insert emoticons or change the text and background colors on the toolbars and in the formatting menu. These are panels you open by pressing Down Arrow or Enter on their respective menu/toolbar items and then use the arrow keys to select the item you want to be applied/inserted. All of these items are screen reader enabled allowing the visually impaired to navigate the toolbars and menu structure.