ADA Website Lawsuits in 2025: Statistics, Trends, and How to Protect Your Business

ADA website lawsuits are not slowing down. Here are the current numbers and what they mean for your business.

2025 Lawsuit Statistics

These numbers only capture federal court filings. Many additional cases are filed in state courts or resolved through demand letters that never become public court filings.

Who Gets Targeted

Ecommerce Dominates

According to EcomBack's reporting, ecommerce websites account for approximately 77% of digital accessibility lawsuits. Online stores are disproportionately targeted because:

• Product images frequently lack alt text
• Checkout flows often have unlabeled form fields
• Filtering and sorting controls may not be keyboard accessible
• Dynamic content (cart updates, error messages) often is not announced to screen readers

Top States for Filings

Based on Seyfarth Shaw's historical data, the states with the highest volume of ADA Title III federal filings are:

1. New York (consistently the highest volume)
2. Florida
3. California
4. Illinois
5. Pennsylvania

New York's position is partly driven by state-level accessibility laws and an active plaintiff's bar.

Serial Plaintiffs Drive Volume

A significant portion of ADA website lawsuits are filed by a relatively small number of repeat plaintiffs and law firms. These are not random. Plaintiffs' attorneys use automated tools to identify sites with obvious violations, then file complaints against multiple businesses simultaneously.

Settlement Costs

According to data compiled by Accessible.org, most ADA website lawsuits settle in the $5,000 to $75,000 range. This includes:

• Settlement payment to the plaintiff
• Plaintiff's attorney fees
• Agreement to remediate the website (typically within 6-12 months)
• Ongoing monitoring requirements (often 2-3 years)

Some notable larger settlements:

• Fashion Nova: agreed to pay $5.15 million and make its website and app accessible (reported by the National Law Review)
• Winn-Dixie: landmark case that went to trial (later reversed on standing, but still influential)

Your own attorney fees are additional costs not included in settlement amounts.

Overlays Do Not Protect You

One of the most important data points from EcomBack's H1 2025 report: 22.6% of websites that were sued for ADA violations had an accessibility overlay widget installed at the time they were sued.

Overlay widgets (from companies like accessiBe, UserWay, and others) add a toolbar to your site that claims to fix accessibility issues on the fly. In practice:

• They cannot reliably fix underlying HTML/CSS issues
• Screen readers often conflict with overlay modifications
• The FTC fined accessiBe $1 million in January 2025 for deceptive marketing claims about their product's ability to make websites ADA compliant (reported by FTC.gov)
• Major disability advocacy organizations, including the National Federation of the Blind, have publicly opposed overlay products

For more detail, see our article on why accessibility overlays don't work.

How to Protect Your Business

1. Know Your Current State

Run an automated accessibility scan to understand your baseline. OnePageAudit provides a free scan that identifies critical WCAG violations in under 60 seconds.

2. Fix High-Priority Issues First

Focus on the violations that plaintiffs' attorneys look for first:

• Images without alt text
• Missing form labels
• Empty links and buttons
• Insufficient color contrast
• No keyboard navigation
• Missing page language attribute

3. Document Your Remediation

Courts look favorably on good-faith efforts. Maintain records of:

• Audit dates and results
• Issues identified and fixed
• Your accessibility statement
• Ongoing monitoring plan

4. Monitor Continuously

Accessibility is not a one-time fix. Content updates, new features, and CMS changes can reintroduce issues. Regular scanning catches problems before they become legal exposure.

• ADA Compliance Checker: How to Test Your Website
• ADA Compliance for Small Business
• ADA Compliance for Ecommerce