Universal Design Goal
Become comfortable with incorporating both Emerging and Developing Steps into your workflow in order to meet universal design goals for Tables.
Emerging Step - Designate a Header Row
Adobe Acrobat Professional DC
In order to add a table header row to a table in Acrobat DC, select the table and click on Table Editor in the Reading Order window.

The table cells will be outlined in red and each cell will have a tag, either TH (table header) or TD (table data). The top row should be marked with TH and remaining cells should usually be TD.
This example shows what a table should look like in the table editor:

To make the top row to a header row, each cell must be changed individually. Right click on a cell and select Table Cell Properties.

Change the Type from Data Cell to Header Cell and set the Scope to Column. Repeat with the each of the top row cells.

Microsoft PowerPoint
To set the header row on a table in PowerPoint, select the Design tab in the ribbon under Table Tools.
Check the checkbox titled Header Row at the top left of the Design ribbon. If the table also has a header column, check the box titled First Column.

Microsoft Word
Table Properties
To define the header row on a table in Word in a way that benefits visual users as well as screen reader users, right-click on the top row of the table and select Table Properties.

In Table Properties on the Row tab, check the box to Repeat as header row at the top of each page.

Table Design Tools
Also make sure that the header row and/or column is set in the Table Design Tools. Setting the table headers here does not allow the header row to repeat on multiple pages but it remains important, especially when saving to another format such as PDF.
Select the Design tab in the ribbon under Table Tools.
Check the checkbox titled Header Row at the top left of the Design ribbon. If the table also has a header column, check the box titled First Column.

Websites
- Use tables for tabular data only, not as a framework for page layout.
- Keep tables as simple as possible, and try to avoid nesting tables inside one another.
- Add captions to tables using the <caption> tag. A caption will typically provide an adequate summary of the table’s contents. Complex tables may need a more detailed explanation using the <table> tag’s “summary” attribute.
- In the header row of the table, replace <td> (table data) tags with <th>(table header) tags to indicate the special function of those cells as column labels.
Developing Steps
Consolidate Header Rows
One problem you may run into is that there are multiple rows with header information in a table. In this example, there are three header rows with several merged cells. We need to simplify the information so that there’s only one header row.

The first step is to consolidate necessary header information into one row. There’s an extra row of merged cells just for “percent production.” This refers to the four cells beneath it, coal, petroleum, natural gas and other. If we add “percent production” into each cell of the next row, we can eliminate the extra row and also the merged cells.

Now the table has only two header rows, but it hasn’t lost any of the information from the original table:

Move Title Information Out
Often, titles are included inside a table. However, these shouldn’t be part of the table itself.
In our example table, the first row is a single merged cell with the text “Table 3. Energy production by major source from 1960 to 1980.” This is clearly the title of the table. By moving it to a heading outside of the table, we can eliminate an extra row as well as merged cells.

Now that the title has been removed, our table only has one header row. This table is much simpler and easier to read for everyone, including screen reader users:

Proficient Steps
Remove Non-Data
- Tables are for presenting data. Any explanation of the table or extra details should be explained in the surrounding text, not within the table itself.
- Move any text that is not data or header information outside of the table into a caption or table description.
Unmerge Cells
Merged cells usually exist for visual appearance, but they create confusion for screen reader users.
- Repeat information in cells if necessary.
- Leaving cells blank is not ideal for accessibility, but is better than merged cells.
Advanced Steps
Split into Multiple Tables
Splitting a table can eliminate merged cells, extra titles and other content that is not truly part of the table data.
To know where a table may be split, look for:
- Blank rows
- Extra title rows in the middle of the table
- Rows with merged cells in the middle of the table
Move Remaining Extra Content
- Move any remaining content of merged cells outside the table