Faculty and staff | University of Toronto

Celebrates hub page | University of Toronto

News search | University of Toronto

News | University of Toronto

Contact U of T News | University of Toronto

Campus status | University of Toronto

UTogether: Your guide to the U of T community | University of Toronto

Visitors | University of Toronto

Current students | University of Toronto

Libraries | University of Toronto

Avoid opening links in a new tab or window. Where you must do this, include an explanation
in the text of the link.

## Why this matters

Opening links in a new tab or window breaks the back button and can be disorientating for 
novice web users, and the visually impaired. Generally you should avoid opening links in a
new tab or window, but if you have to, you should include text explaining that this will happen.

## How to fix

An explanation must be clear in the accessible text for the link. For example:

```html
<a href="products.html" target="_blank">
    Products (opens in new window)
</a>
```

Or, for an image inside a link:

```html
<a href="products.html" target="_blank">
    <img src="products.jpg" alt="Products (opens in new window)">
</a>
```

Rather than updating all of your links manually to do this, you can add a simple CSS
selector, such as:

```css
a[target="_blank"]:after {
    content: " (opens in new window)";
}
```

Note that doing this with an icon, is not sufficient to pass this check. The text must be
readable by screen readers.

Alternatively you can override the link text for accessible technologies (like screenreaders),
so that the appearance of the link does not change. For example:

```html
<a href="products.html" target="_blank" aria-label="Products (opens in new window)">
    Products
</a>
```

Note that if you do this, the `aria-label` will replace the text content of the link completely,
so it must still make sense in isolation.

## Terminology

Although it is common to say "opens in new window", almost all browsers now use tabs, and
so this terminology is potentially confusing. You may prefer: "opens in new tab".

## Methodology

1. Silktide considers all links on a page with a `target` attribute of `_blank`.
2. For each link, Silktide considers the screen-readable text of the link, which includes:
   * The text content of the link
   * Any `alt` text inside any images inside the link
   * Any `aria-label` or `aria-labelled-by` text
   * The `content` of the pseudo-elements `:before` and `:after`
3. This text is analysed for the presence of common text, including "opens new tab"
    and "opens new window". If the text is not found, the link fails the test.

## Further reading

Generally best practice is to avoid opening links in a new tab or window.  

The W3C provides detailed guidance on 
[when opening a link in a new window may be appropriate](https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20-TECHS/G200.html).

link-text-explains-open-in-new-window

February 2025

January 2025

University of Toronto

Title / URL	Issues
Faculty and staff \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/faculty-staff	14
Celebrates hub page \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/celebrates	11
News search \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/news/searchnews	11
News \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/news	11
Contact U of T News \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/news/contact-us	11
Campus status \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/campus-status	9
UTogether: Your guide to the U of T community \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/utogether	8
Visitors \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/visitors	8
Current students \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/current-students	8
Libraries \| University of Torontowww.utoronto.ca/libraries	8

Ensure links explain they open in a new tab

University of Toronto

Where this issue has occurred