Designers, your excuse is gone. Stunning, animated and accessible. Yes, you can!

By Anne-Mieke Bovelett on March 14, 2025
Status: up to date

The new GitHub signup experience is proof: Accessibility and stunning animated design can go hand in hand

Two years ago, I wrote a request on GitHub’s Community Discussion Pages for Accessibility. I asked for an alternative signup experience. One that wouldn’t make thousands of people like me, with ADHD and dyslexia and other cognitive challenges, feel like we were battling through a motion-heavy, visually overwhelming process just to create an account.

I didn’t know if anything would come of it. I just knew that staying silent wouldn’t change anything.

Fast forward to March 7, 2025, exactly two years later, and I got my answer.

Carie Fisher, a true accessibility powerhouse and one of my heroes in our field, had joined GitHub as a Senior Accessibility Program Manager. She took the trouble of keeping me updated. In August 2024 she responded on GitHub that this issues was being followed up internally. They did not know the timeline yet, but I was so happy to see this was taken seriously! A week ago, she commented: ‘Hey @Bovelett – a new sign-up experience recently launched. It streamlines the process, keeps accessibility in mind, and stays true to the brand. We’d love for you to try it out and share your thoughts!”

I did.

And let me tell you: It’s spectacular.

Sorry, dear designers, your excuses are officially dead

For years, I’ve heard the same tired argument: “We can’t make a beautiful website if we have to follow accessibility guidelines.”

GitHub just proved you wrong.

This isn’t just an accessible signup flow. It’s also a gorgeous one! It’s proof that you can design something that’s visually compelling and usable by everyone. You don’t have to strip things down to the bare minimum or sacrifice creativity. You just have to design with intent. Something I teach designers in my awareness sessions.

Accessibility is never a compromise. It’s an upgrade

Now, the signup experience is streamlined, accessible, and still completely on-brand. It doesn’t force unnecessary motion on users who don’t want it. It fully respects it when a user has set “reduce motion” in their operating system. It respects different ways of interacting with the web. And most importantly, it makes the experience better for everyone. Not just those of us in the accessibility community.

The takeaway? Speak up. Keep pushing.

If I had just shrugged and moved on in 2023, nothing would have changed.

But I asked. I nudged every now and then on social media. And I kept the conversation going.

Accessibility isn’t about quick wins. It is about persistence. It’s about knowing that change is possible, even when it feels slow. And sometimes, it’s about the right people stepping in at the right time, like Carie Fisher and the team at GitHub who chose to do the work.

So, next time someone tells you that accessibility is a constraint? Show them GitHub’s signup experience.

The proof is right there.