# Four principles

WCAG 2.2 groups success criteria under four principles published by the W3C: perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust. The specification is [Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2](https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG22/). This page names the principles in this shelf's words. It does not copy the success criteria.

- Perceivable. A person can find the information with a sense they have. Text is not only color. An image that carries meaning has a text alternative the user supplied or that is missing.
- Operable. A person can do the thing from the keyboard, and nothing asks them to use a pointer they do not have. A control has a visible name.
- Understandable. The name matches the action. An error says what went wrong in words.
- Robust. The control is a real control (a button, a link, an input), not a clickable div whose role the user could not name.

A pass here records what the user showed. It is not a WCAG conformance claim.