---
title: "Enhance the accessibility of your reading app"
description: "Build accessible long-form reading experiences with VoiceOver, Speak Screen, text navigation, page turning, selection, and UITextInput."
shoutout: "Unofficial, made with love by Superwall - the best way to monetize your apps."
category: "Accessibility & Inclusion"
---

# Enhance the accessibility of your reading app


[Watch on Apple Developer](https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2026/219/)

Build accessible long-form reading experiences with VoiceOver, Speak Screen, text navigation, page turning, selection, and UITextInput.

## TL;DR

- Use standard text controls first: UITextView, SwiftUI TextEditor, selectable SwiftUI Text, and NSTextView already provide granular navigation and accessible selection through UITextInput.
- Connect separate paragraphs or text elements with text navigation APIs, or SwiftUI accessibilityLinkedGroup, so VoiceOver can move by line, word, or character across element boundaries.
- For paginated reading, mark the final readable element with the causesPageTurn trait and implement accessibilityScroll so VoiceOver and Speak Screen can continue read-all across pages.
- For custom-rendered or scanned text, adopt UITextInput fully, including text ranges, selection geometry, tokenizer behavior, and optional UITextInteraction for standard selection visuals.

## What makes reading accessibility different

Long-form reading is not the same problem as navigating controls. A good reading app lets assistive technologies move fluidly through text, continue reading without interruptions, and select text with the same fidelity users expect from system text views.

The session focuses on three goals for apps that display paginated or multi-paragraph content: granular text navigation, continuous reading, and comprehensive text selection. The examples center on VoiceOver and Speak Screen, with benefits extending to Accessibility Reader.

- Granular navigation means VoiceOver and Speak Screen can move by line, word, character, and other text granularities.
- Continuous reading means read-all gestures can proceed through paragraphs and pages without stopping at artificial layout boundaries.
- Accessible selection means users can select text and discover selection-related actions through assistive technologies.

## Start with standard text views when possible

Apple's standard text components already implement the high-fidelity text accessibility behavior needed for reading. UIKit UITextView, SwiftUI TextEditor, selectable SwiftUI Text, and AppKit NSTextView provide line, word, and character navigation plus accessible text selection.

UIAccessibilityReadingContent remains useful for full-page reading support, but this session emphasizes UITextInput because it is the protocol used by native text views and can also be adopted by custom views.

- Use UITextView on iOS when the layout can be represented with system text views.
- Use SwiftUI TextEditor or Text with textSelection enabled for accessible SwiftUI text.
- Use NSTextView, or the SwiftUI text views above, for macOS apps.
- Prefer these components before building custom-rendered text, because they supply much of the accessibility behavior automatically.

## Link separate text elements into one reading flow

Separate paragraph views can break VoiceOver's line-by-line navigation: when the user reaches the end of one element, VoiceOver may not know which text element should come next. Text navigation APIs let each element expose its next and previous accessible text element so navigation continues across boundaries.

In SwiftUI, accessibilityLinkedGroup links multiple selectable text elements in the same group to provide equivalent text navigation behavior. The transcript notes this SwiftUI modifier as starting in iOS 27. On macOS AppKit, accessibilitySharedTextUIElements provides a similar result.

- Set accessibilityNextTextNavigationElement and accessibilityPreviousTextNavigationElement for adjacent UIKit text elements.
- Use the same accessibilityLinkedGroup id and namespace for SwiftUI text elements that should be treated as one linked reading group.
- Audit with the VoiceOver lines rotor to confirm users can move from the last line of one paragraph to the first line of the next.

### Connect UIKit paragraph views for VoiceOver text navigation

Each paragraph identifies its adjacent text element, allowing VoiceOver to continue granular navigation across separate views.

```swift
import UIKit

class TravelGuidePageController: UIViewController {
    var paragraphs: [TravelGuideParagraph] = []

    func configureNavigationElements() {
        for (index, paragraph) in paragraphs.enumerated() {
            if index + 1 < paragraphs.count {
                paragraph.accessibilityNextTextNavigationElement = paragraphs[index + 1]
            }
            if index - 1 >= 0 {
                paragraph.accessibilityPreviousTextNavigationElement = paragraphs[index - 1]
            }
        }
    }
}
```

### Link selectable SwiftUI Text elements

Text elements with the same linked group id and namespace participate in a shared navigation sequence.

```swift
import SwiftUI

struct PageView: View {
    @Namespace private var pageNamespace
    var paragraphs: [String]
    var pageNumber: Int

    var body: some View {
        Text(paragraphs[0])
            .textSelection(.enabled)
            .accessibilityLinkedGroup(id: pageNumber, in: pageNamespace)

        Text(paragraphs[1])
            .textSelection(.enabled)
            .accessibilityLinkedGroup(id: pageNumber, in: pageNamespace)
    }
}
```

## Support read-all across pages

Paginated content can interrupt read-all experiences in VoiceOver and Speak Screen. Marking the final text element on a page with the causesPageTurn trait tells assistive technologies that reaching this element can trigger a page transition.

Pair causesPageTurn with accessibilityScroll so the app can move to the next or previous page and post a page-scrolled notification. This lets Speak Screen and VoiceOver continue reading into the next page automatically, instead of stopping at the bottom of the current page.

- Apply causesPageTurn to the last readable element on a page in UIKit or SwiftUI.
- Implement accessibilityScroll(_:) to perform the page turn requested by the assistive technology.
- Post UIAccessibility.Notification.pageScrolled with a useful page status string after moving pages.

### Advance pages during continuous reading

The final paragraph advertises that it can cause a page turn, while accessibilityScroll performs the page navigation and announces the result.

```swift
import UIKit

class TravelGuidePageController: UIViewController {
    override func viewDidLoad() {
        super.viewDidLoad()
        lastParagraphView.accessibilityTraits.insert(.causesPageTurn)
    }

    override func accessibilityScroll(_ direction: UIAccessibilityScrollDirection) -> Bool {
        moveToPage(direction)
        let scrollString = "Page \(currentPage) of \(pages.count)"
        UIAccessibility.post(notification: .pageScrolled, argument: scrollString)
        return true
    }
}
```

## Expose selection actions through the edit rotor

System text views already provide accessible text selection. If the app adds selection-specific features, such as saving selected content, make them discoverable through VoiceOver's edit rotor rather than only through visual controls.

Use UIAccessibilityCustomAction and set its category to UIAccessibilityCustomAction.editCategory for actions associated with text editing or selection. Preserve any custom actions from the superclass.

- Use the text selection rotor to test expanding and shrinking selection by word, line, or other granularities.
- Use the edit rotor for actions that operate on the current text selection.
- Do not categorize selection actions as generic actions when they belong with editing behavior.

### Add a selection-related action to the edit rotor

The custom action appears in VoiceOver's edit rotor because it is categorized as an editing action.

```swift
import UIKit

class TravelGuideParagraph: UITextView {
    override var accessibilityCustomActions: [UIAccessibilityCustomAction]? {
        get {
            let saveAction = UIAccessibilityCustomAction(name: "Save Recommendation") { _ in
                self.saveRecommendation()
            }
            saveAction.category = UIAccessibilityCustomAction.editCategory
            return (super.accessibilityCustomActions ?? []) + [saveAction]
        }
        set { }
    }

    private func saveRecommendation() -> Bool {
        // Save the current selection.
        return true
    }
}
```

## Make custom-rendered text accessible with UITextInput

Custom typography, shared rendering engines, and scanned pages can remove the accessibility behavior that system text views provide. For custom-rendered or image-based text, adopt UITextInput on the accessibility element to give assistive technologies the same model of text, ranges, selection, and geometry that native text controls expose.

A complete UITextInput implementation must manage text ranges, return substrings for queried ranges, compute selection rectangles, and provide a tokenizer for navigation by line, sentence, word, and character. The session emphasizes implementing the protocol in its entirety to receive the full accessibility benefit.

UITextInteraction can be added to a custom text view for familiar selection handles and highlights. Notify the input delegate when selectedTextRange changes so the system updates selection visuals.

- Implement selectionRects(for:) using the geometry of the rendered text or scanned image.
- Implement text(in:) so assistive technologies can retrieve the exact string for a requested range.
- Provide a UITextInputTokenizer, such as a custom tokenizer based on UITextInputStringTokenizer when appropriate.
- Combine UITextInput with causesPageTurn and text navigation APIs for custom paginated reading content.

### Adopt UITextInput for scanned or custom-rendered text

The custom view exposes text geometry, text extraction, tokenization, and selection changes so assistive technologies can navigate and select custom content.

```swift
import UIKit

class ScannedPage: UIView, UITextInput {
    override init(frame: CGRect) {
        super.init(frame: frame)
        let interaction = UITextInteraction(for: .nonEditable)
        interaction.textInput = self
        addInteraction(interaction)
    }

    func selectionRects(for range: UITextRange) -> [UITextSelectionRect] {
        var rects: [UITextSelectionRect] = []
        let startLine = lineIndex(for: range.start)
        let endLine = lineIndex(for: range.end)
        for line in startLine...endLine {
            rects.append(selectionRectFromImage(for: range, in: line))
        }
        return rects
    }

    func text(in range: UITextRange) -> String? {
        let nsRange = nsRange(from: range)
        guard let range = Range(nsRange, in: scannedText) else { return nil }
        return String(scannedText[range])
    }

    var tokenizer: any UITextInputTokenizer {
        CustomHandwritingTokenizer(textInput: self)
    }

    weak var inputDelegate: UITextInputDelegate?

    var selectedTextRange: UITextRange? {
        willSet { inputDelegate?.selectionWillChange(self) }
        didSet { inputDelegate?.selectionDidChange(self) }
    }
}
```

## Resources

- [accessibilityNextTextNavigationElement](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/ObjectiveC/NSObject-swift.class/accessibilityNextTextNavigationElement)
- [editCategory](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/UIKit/UIAccessibilityCustomAction/editCategory)
- [accessibilityLinkedGroup(id:in:)](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/SwiftUI/View/accessibilityLinkedGroup(id:in:))
- [causesPageTurn](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/SwiftUI/AccessibilityTraits/causesPageTurn)
- [UITextInput](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/UIKit/UITextInput)
- [Accessibility for UIKit](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/UIKit/accessibility-for-uikit)

## Related Sessions

- [Creating an Accessible Reading Experience](https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2019/248)

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