Does my website have to be accessible by law?

It depends on two different regimes. Italy's Legge Stanca (art. 3, paragraph 1-bis) only binds private entities whose average turnover over the last three financial years exceeds 500 million euros: almost no SME falls under it. The European Accessibility Act (Legislative Decree 82/2022), since 28 June 2025, instead binds anyone operating in six specific sectors regardless of turnover: e-commerce, consumer banking services, electronic communications, audiovisual media, passenger transport, and e-books.

What happens if a business doesn't comply?

For most companies involved, article 24 of Legislative Decree 82/2022 sets an administrative fine of 5,000 to 40,000 euros, based on severity and the number of users affected, plus 2,500-30,000 euros for failing to cooperate with the supervisory authority. Only entities with turnover above 500 million euros face a fine of up to 5% of annual turnover instead. AgID, Italy's digital agency, made its sanctioning power operational with a regulation dated 15 May 2026.

What does it mean, in practice, for a website to be accessible?

AgID's technical guidelines equate accessibility with meeting WCAG 2.1 level AA, organised around the four principles of perceivable, operable, understandable, robust. It's the same standard referenced by AgID's new guidelines for private-sector services, adopted on 4 March 2026.

Where can a non-accessible website be reported?

AgID provides a reporting platform, reachable from its official accessibility page, for anyone who runs into an accessibility problem on a digital service that should comply with Legislative Decree 82/2022.

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Website accessibility: when the law actually requires it

Q: If I run a small online store, am I obliged to comply?

E-commerce is one of the six sectors covered by the European Accessibility Act, so in principle yes, since 28 June 2025. There is an exception for microenterprises, fewer than 10 employees and annual turnover or balance sheet up to 2 million euros, which are exempt from accessibility requirements on services. The exemption doesn't cover any products the company places on the market.

Q: Is installing an accessibility plugin or widget enough to comply?

AgID's guidelines call for a documented review against a structured checklist, not a single automated scan. An automated tool can help spot some issues, but on its own it doesn't replace that review.

4 August 2026

A man wearing dark glasses and headphones reads a braille text in front of a computer, in a library

A website is considered accessible when it meets WCAG 2.1 level AA, the technical standard referenced both by Italy's Legge Stanca and by AgID's new 2026 guidelines. But the question that matters most to a business is usually a different one: am I required to reach it? The answer depends on two different regimes, with very different thresholds, and most SMEs actually fall under only one of the two, not both and not neither.

Legge Stanca only binds private entities above 500 million in turnover

Law 9 January 2004, no. 4, known as Legge Stanca, was written for public administration. A paragraph added in 2020 (art. 3, paragraph 1-bis, introduced by the Simplification decree, Decree-Law 76/2020, converted into Law 120/2020) extended its scope to private entities offering services to the public through websites or apps, but only if their average turnover over the last three financial years exceeds 500 million euros (source: Law 4/2004, art. 3, current text on Normattiva, checked 4 August 2026). It's a threshold aimed at large companies: the vast majority of Italian SMEs, including mid-to-large ones, fall outside this specific obligation.

The obligation that actually reaches SMEs comes from a different law

The regime that touches smaller companies isn't Legge Stanca, it's Legislative Decree 27 May 2022, no. 82, which transposes European directive 2019/882, the European Accessibility Act. Here turnover doesn't matter, the sector does. The obligations apply from 28 June 2025 (source: Legislative Decree 82/2022, art. 1, and EU Directive 2019/882, art. 2, checked 4 August 2026) to anyone providing, among others:

e-commerce
consumer banking services
electronic communication services
services giving access to audiovisual media
passenger transport, including websites, apps and electronic ticketing
e-books

If your business falls into one of these six categories, the obligation doesn't depend on how much you turn over: it depends on what you sell or provide online.

The microenterprise exemption only covers services

There is an exception, but it's narrower than many summaries floating around suggest. Article 3, paragraph 3 of the decree exempts microenterprises, companies with fewer than 10 employees and annual turnover or balance sheet not exceeding 2 million euros, from accessibility requirements, but only for the services they provide (source: Legislative Decree 82/2022, arts. 2 and 3, checked 4 August 2026). If that same microenterprise places a product covered by the decree on the market, for instance a hardware device, that product doesn't get the same automatic exemption: it can only invoke, like any other company, the disproportionate burden clause, with the sole advantage of not having to document that assessment in writing.

What it means, in practice, for a website to be accessible

Both Legge Stanca and the new guidelines for private services, adopted by AgID on 4 March 2026 and published in the Official Gazette on 24 March 2026, point to the same technical standard: WCAG 2.1 level AA (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines), organised around four principles remembered by the acronym POUR: perceivable, operable, understandable, robust (source: AgID's technical guidelines on the accessibility of IT tools, checked 4 August 2026). It isn't a level reached by installing a plugin: the March 2026 guidelines call for a review against a structured checklist, not a single automated scan. An automated tool helps spot some of the issues, but doesn't replace that review.

What a business risks if it doesn't comply

Who	Rule	Fine
Private entities with average turnover over 500 million euros	Art. 9, paragraph 1-bis, Law 4/2004	Up to 5% of annual turnover
Operators in the six sectors covered by the EAA	Art. 24, paragraph 1, Legislative Decree 82/2022	5,000 to 40,000 euros
Failure to cooperate with the supervisory authority	Art. 24, paragraphs 2 and 3, Legislative Decree 82/2022	2,500 to 30,000 euros

AgID oversees both fronts, and since 15 May 2026 it also has its own operating regulation for establishing violations and applying fines (provision no. 84/2026), plus a dedicated reporting platform, linked from AgID's official accessibility page, for anyone who runs into a non-compliant website. These aren't tools announced for the future: they're already running.

Where to start

Before worrying about technical compliance, the first question is simpler: does your website or app fall into one of the six sectors of the European Accessibility Act, or does your average turnover exceed 500 million euros? If the answer to both is no, you don't have a specific legal obligation today, though all the non-legal reasons why a more accessible website works better for everyone who uses it still stand. If the answer is yes, and you're not a microenterprise exempt on services, it's worth finding out where your website stands against WCAG 2.1 AA before a report or an inspection arrives.

If you'd like to work out where your website stands, both on the obligation and on how it's built today, it can be part of the digital check-up, alongside everything else. Otherwise write to me: a couple of lines on what your business does online are enough to tell right away whether you fall into one of the six sectors.