ARIA Changes

v5 adds ARIA 1.3 support and changes the default ARIA version to 1.3. The wai-aria rule option is also renamed.

What changed

Change	Who is affected
ARIA 1.3 support added (now default)	All users
generic role becomes transparent in 1.3	All users
<aside> conditional role mapping in 1.3	All users
image / img role synonym in 1.3	All users
wai-aria option renamed	Users with checkingRequiredOwnedElements in config

ARIA version configuration

The default ARIA version is now "1.3". If you need the previous behavior, set ariaVersion globally via ruleCommonSettings. See the Config migration guide for details on this new property.

{
  "ruleCommonSettings": {
    "ariaVersion": "1.2"
  }
}

You can also set it per rule:

{
  "rules": {
    "wai-aria": {
      "options": {
        "version": "1.2"
      }
    }
  }
}

note

The default is "1.3". You only need to change your config if you want ARIA 1.2 behavior.

Generic role transparency (ARIA 1.3)

This is the most significant change in ARIA 1.3. Elements with the generic role -- including bare <div> and <span> -- become transparent in accessibility tree traversal.

Before (ARIA 1.2)

A <div> wrapper between a tablist and its tab children breaks the parent-child role relationship:

<!-- ARIA 1.2: Error -- <div> blocks the tablist > tab relationship -->
<div role="tablist">
  <div class="wrapper">
    <button role="tab">Tab 1</button>
  </div>
</div>

After (ARIA 1.3)

The same HTML passes. ARIA 1.3 says user agents must ignore elements with the generic or none role:

<!-- ARIA 1.3: OK -- <div> (generic) is transparent -->
<div role="tablist">
  <div class="wrapper">
    <button role="tab">Tab 1</button>
  </div>
</div>

Version comparison

Behavior	'1.1' / '1.2'	'1.3'
generic transparent for child roles	No	Yes
generic transparent for parent role	No	Yes
presentation / none transparent for child roles	Yes	Yes
presentation / none transparent for parent role	No	Yes

<aside> conditional role mapping (ARIA 1.3)

The <aside> element now uses conditional role mapping per the ARIA 1.3 spec:

• When <aside> is not a descendant of <article>, <aside>, <main>, <nav>, or <section> → role is complementary
• When <aside> is a descendant of one of those sectioning elements → role is generic

The landmark-roles rule has been updated accordingly: complementary is no longer checked as a top-level landmark.

caution

Since ARIA 1.3 is now the default, this change affects all users immediately. If your markup uses <aside> inside sectioning elements, you may see new or different lint results.

image / img role synonym (ARIA 1.3)

In ARIA 1.3, image is the primary role name and img is a synonym. When either appears in an element's permitted roles, both are accepted:

<!-- ARIA 1.2: permitted roles include only "img" -->
<!-- ARIA 1.3: permitted roles include both "image" and "img" -->
<img alt="photo" />

Rule option renamed

The wai-aria rule option checkingRequiredOwnedElements has been renamed:

v5 (new)	v4 (deprecated)
checkingAllowedAccessibilityChildRoles	checkingRequiredOwnedElements

tip

The old name still works. Update it when convenient -- there is no rush.

{
  "rules": {
    "wai-aria": {
      "options": {
        "checkingAllowedAccessibilityChildRoles": false
      }
    }
  }
}

Terminology changes (for custom rule authors)

For custom rule authors

This section covers internal API changes. If you only configure ARIA rules, you can skip it.

ARIA 1.3 renames several internal concepts. The ARIARole type exposes both old and new property names:

ARIA 1.3 (new)	ARIA 1.2 (deprecated)
requiredAccessibilityParentRole	requiredContextRole
allowedAccessibilityChildRoles	requiredOwnedElements

Both properties hold the same values. The old names are kept as @deprecated aliases.