Newsroom | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Road safety | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Safety at home | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Join our team | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Fire Cadets | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Our governance | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Water safety | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Christmas safety | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Business safety | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

Chimney safety | Cumbria Fire & Rescue Service

When selecting a user interface component with the keyboard, the focus indicator must 
not be completely obscured by anything in front of it.

## Why this matters

When using a keyboard, it is important that the user can see where they are on the page.
If the focus indicator is obscured, the user may not know where they are, and may not
be able to interact with the page.

## Examples

Most common examples include:

* Banners at the top or bottom of the page, such as cookie banners
* Fixed navigation bars
* Fixed footers
* Popup modals, such as cookie consent modals

## How to fix

With elements that cover part of the screen, such as cookie banners, ensure
that the user can scroll to see any content behind the banner, without having to close
the banner.

With popup modals, it should usually be impossible to focus anything behind the modal.
Most common modal frameworks will automatically trap focus within the modal, so that
this is impossible. Example: [Bootstrap Modal](https://getbootstrap.com/docs/5.2/components/modal/#live-demo).

## Further reading

This is part of the draft WCAG 2.2 specification and is subject to change.

* [WCAG 2.4.12](https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG22/Understanding/focus-not-obscured.html)

ensure-focus-is-not-obscured-minimum

June 2025

May 2025

Cumbria Fire and Rescue Service

Title / URL	Issues
Newsroom \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/news	26
Road safety \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/road-safety	24
Safety at home \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/safety-home	23
Join our team \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/join-our-team	23
Fire Cadets \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/fire-cadets	23
Our governance \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/our-governance	23
Water safety \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/water-safety	23
Christmas safety \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/christmas-safety	23
Business safety \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/business-safety	22
Chimney safety \| Cumbria Fire & Rescue Servicewww.cumbriafire.gov.uk/chimney-safety	22

Ensure focus is not fully obscured

Cumbria Fire and Rescue Service

Where this issue has occurred