Women in History | English Heritage

Travel Guides | English Heritage

Members' quizzes | English Heritage

The English Heritage Podcast | English Heritage

Roman Britain | English Heritage

Black History | English Heritage

An Introduction to Prehistoric England | English Heritage

Stonehenge | English Heritage

Victorians | English Heritage

Collections | English Heritage

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

May 2025

April 2025

English Heritage

Title / URL	Issues
Women in History \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/women-in-history/	100
Travel Guides \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/inspire-me/travel-guides/	100
Members' quizzes \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/members-area/members-magazine/quizzes/	100
The English Heritage Podcast \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/inspire-me/podcast/	100
Roman Britain \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/story-of-england/romans/	100
Black History \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/histories/black-history/	100
An Introduction to Prehistoric England \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/story-of-england/prehistory/	100
Stonehenge \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stonehenge/	92
Victorians \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/story-of-england/victorian/	91
Collections \| English Heritagewww.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/collections/	87

Ensure focus is not fully obscured

English Heritage

Where this issue has occurred