How to fix image redundant alt on WooCommerce

Steps for WooCommerce

1. In WordPress admin, go to Appearance → Theme File Editor (or use a child theme and edit files via FTP/SFTP).
2. Open the relevant template: for product cards it is typically woocommerce/content-product.php or templates/loop/loop-start.php inside your theme or child theme.
3. Locate the woocommerce_template_loop_product_thumbnail() call or the direct <img> tag output. WooCommerce renders product thumbnails via the woocommerce_get_product_thumbnail() function, which passes the alt from the media library.
4. Go to Media → Library, find the product image, click Edit, and clear the 'Alternative Text' field so it saves as empty — WooCommerce will then render alt="".
5. Alternatively, use the filter hook: add_filter('woocommerce_product_get_image', ...) in your child theme's functions.php to strip redundant alt text programmatically.
6. Flush any caching plugin cache, then re-test with axe DevTools.

What is image redundant alt?

Every image on a webpage can carry an "alt" attribute — a short text description that screen readers announce to blind or low-vision shoppers instead of (or in addition to) showing the image. When an image sits right next to visible text that already says the exact same thing — for example, a product photo inside a link that also contains the product name — a screen reader will read that description twice in a row. This is called "redundant alt text." The fix is to make the image's alt attribute empty (alt="") so the screen reader skips the image and only reads the visible text once, giving a clean, natural experience.

Screen reader users — a significant and legally protected segment of shoppers — hear redundant information announced back-to-back, which is confusing and frustrating, and can cause them to abandon your store. Accessibility failures like this create legal exposure under the ADA (USA), the European Accessibility Act (EU), and similar laws worldwide, which have already resulted in costly lawsuits against online retailers. Beyond legal risk, accessibility is a known quality signal: Google's Lighthouse tool flags these issues and they contribute to a lower accessibility score, which can indirectly affect rankings. Fixing this issue is low effort and directly improves the shopping experience for customers using assistive technology.

See the complete Image redundant alt guide for every platform and the full background.