2.4.1 · Level A · WCAG 2.0 · Operable → Navigable

Bypass Blocks

A mechanism exists to skip repeated blocks of content — most commonly a 'skip to main content' link before the navigation.

Why it matters

Without a skip link, a keyboard or screen reader user has to tab through the entire header and navigation menu on every single page before reaching the actual content.

Automatically detected

axe-core can confirm a skip link or landmark structure exists; whether it actually lands somewhere useful is worth a manual spot-check.

Related axe-core rules: bypass, landmark-one-main, region

Fails

<body>
  <header><!-- 40 nav links --></header>
  <main>...</main>
</body>

No skip link and no landmark regions — a keyboard user must tab through every nav item before reaching <main>.

Passes

<body>
  <a href="#main" class="skip-link">Skip to main content</a>
  <header><!-- nav --></header>
  <main id="main">...</main>
</body>

A skip link, typically visually hidden until focused, jumps a keyboard user directly to id="main".

Openwell finds violations like this one across your whole site, clusters them by the component that caused them, and generates a fix that's re-validated before you see it.

Scan your site free