Accessible Videos in Switzerland: A Practical Guide for Businesses
An accessible video is one that people who are deaf, hard of hearing, blind or visually impaired can fully understand. In practice that means three things: correct subtitles delivered as a separate file, audio description for anything the picture shows but the soundtrack never says, and a player that works with a keyboard and screen reader. In Switzerland the rules are binding for public bodies and a clear benchmark for everyone else. The cheapest moment to get it right is before the first shot, not after the edit.
This guide is written for Swiss marketing teams, communications managers, event organizers and NGOs who commission video. It covers what the Swiss standards say, what each accessibility feature involves, what it costs, and how to build it into a production without wrecking the budget or the film.
TL;DR
Subtitles are the baseline for any video with speech. Deliver them as a separate SRT file, not burned into the image, and have a person check every line.
Audio description is only needed when key information appears solely on screen. A talking-head interview usually does not need it; a product demo or a drone sequence often does.
Swiss federal guidance estimates audio description at roughly CHF 50 to 100 per minute for script and recording, plus about CHF 15 per minute for integration.
Public bodies and state-concessioned companies are bound by the Disability Discrimination Act (BehiG) and the eCH-0059 standard. Private companies are not bound the same way, but the standard is the sensible yardstick.
Decide on accessibility in the brief. Retrofitting is slower, costlier and usually hurts the final film.
Table of Contents
What “accessible” means for a video
A video combines sound and image, and each can exclude someone. A viewer who cannot hear loses the dialogue. A viewer who cannot see loses everything that is shown but not said. A viewer with a motor impairment may be unable to press a tiny play button. Accessibility is the work of closing each of those gaps.
The Swiss Federal Office for the Equality of People with Disabilities (EBGB) frames it as more than a technical checkbox: it is about equal participation in social and political life, much like a ramp next to a staircase. For a business, the practical result is a wider audience and a brand that visibly does not leave people out. The same subtitles that serve a deaf viewer also serve the colleague watching on a train with the sound off, or the French speaker following a German-language interview.
The international reference is the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, published by the W3C. Swiss rules build on this family of guidelines.
What Swiss rules actually require
Let’s separate what is mandatory from what is advisable, because the two get mixed up constantly.
Mandatory for public bodies. For Swiss government entities and state-concessioned enterprises, accessibility is a legal obligation under the Disability Discrimination Act (BehiG). The eCH-0059 Accessibility Standard sets WCAG 2.1 level AA as the bar for digital content, and time-based media such as video is explicitly within its scope. If you produce video for a canton, a municipality, a public transport operator or a similar body, this is your specification.
Advisable for everyone else. Private companies are not held to the same obligation, but the standard gives you a clear, recognized target. Clients who work with public bodies, tender for public contracts or simply want the widest possible reach tend to adopt it voluntarily. If your organization is unsure which category it falls into, ask your legal counsel before assuming either way. This article is production guidance, not legal advice.
Swiss authorities publish plenty of free material. The EBGB maintains a collection of tools and guides for accessible digital communication, including guides on subtitling videos and on audio description. Cantonal pages such as the Canton of Zurich’s rules for video accessibility are short, concrete and worth reading before you write a brief.
Subtitles: the non-negotiable baseline
If a video has a soundtrack with speech, it needs subtitles. ETH Zurich states the principle plainly in its recommendations for subtitling videos: without them, people with hearing impairments miss essential information.
Quality rules that matter
The ETH guidance gives numbers you can put straight into a brief:
A reading speed of about 15 characters per second.
A maximum of 40 to 45 characters per line.
Synchronized with the speech and clearly legible.
No filler words such as “um” or “uh”.
Subtitles should also name non-speech information that matters, such as a speaker change or a relevant sound. Check the cantonal and federal guides for the exact conventions.
Separate file, never burned in
This is the mistake we see most often. Many producers burn subtitles into the picture because it looks tidy on social media. For accessibility, the Canton of Zurich asks for the opposite: subtitles supplied as an SRT file rather than fixed into the image. A separate file can be read by assistive technology, switched on and off by the viewer, translated into other languages and indexed by search engines. Burned-in text can do none of that.
For social platforms where an open caption genuinely performs better, you can still export a second version with burned-in text. Keep the SRT as the master.
Why auto-captions are not enough
Automatic transcription is a good first draft and a poor final product. It stumbles on names, product terms, Swiss German accents and mixed-language sentences. Swiss accessibility guidance, for instance the checklist item on recorded subtitles, requires machine-generated text to be verified and corrected by a person. In a multilingual country, add this to your plan: if your interview switches between French and German, someone must review both.
Audio description: when you need it and when you do not
Audio description is a narrator’s voice that describes what is visible but not audible, so blind and visually impaired viewers get the full story. The EBGB fact sheet on audio description is the best Swiss starting point.
The decision rule is simple:
Not needed when the soundtrack already carries all the essential information. A standard interview, a lecture or a talking-head message usually qualifies.
Needed when key information is shown only through images or action: a product demonstration without commentary, a process explained with on-screen text, a real estate walkthrough, a drone sequence over a site, a fashion or sports sequence.
The Canton of Zurich adds a useful production tip: in the best case, audio description is already part of the brief for the voice talent. That is the cheapest route. If the narrator already describes what we see (“the lift rises to the fourth floor, where the open-plan office begins”), a separate description track may be unnecessary.
The cheapest fix is a script fix
Most of the burden disappears if the script is written to be heard. Say the product name, say what the button does, read out the on-screen figures, name the location. A film written that way works with the screen switched off and is usually a better film for everyone.
What accessibility costs in Switzerland
Prices vary, so treat these as planning figures, not quotes. The EBGB fact sheet estimates professional audio description at about CHF 50 to 100 per minute of video for script creation and recording, with an additional CHF 15 per minute or so for integrating it into the audio track. It also notes that small projects can carry minimum surcharges, that longer projects may get volume discounts, and that you should request exact quotes from specialized providers.
A worked example: a three-minute corporate film that needs audio description would land, on those estimates, between roughly CHF 150 and CHF 300 for script and recording, plus about CHF 45 for integration. A minimum surcharge could push the real number higher. For a short film that is a modest line in the budget; for a ten-part training series it adds up, which is why prioritizing matters.
Subtitle costs depend on length, language count and how clean the audio is. We do not have a reliable Swiss price benchmark for subtitling to cite, so ask for a per-minute quote that includes human review, and ask for the SRT file as a named deliverable.
Where to start when the budget is limited
Full compliance is the goal, but few organizations can fix a whole video archive at once. ETH Zurich recommends a pragmatic, risk-based order: start with the videos that have the highest public impact. In practice, rank your library like this:
Critical information: safety, health, legal or customer-service videos.
High-reach content: the homepage film, the corporate presentation, the main campaign.
Major events: conference recordings and aftermovies that stay online.
Everything else, as it is updated.
For new productions, skip the triage and build accessibility in from the start. Swiss federal guidance makes the same point: planning for it early (budgeting for audio description, scheduling time for manual subtitle checks) avoids expensive post-production fixes that tend to compromise the final film.
A production workflow that builds accessibility in
Here is the order we recommend for a new video, whether it is a corporate film, a campaign spot or an event recap.
Brief. State the accessibility target in writing: WCAG 2.1 AA if you serve the public sector, or your own stated level. Name the languages.
Script. Write for the ear. Flag any scene where meaning is only visual and decide whether the narration will cover it or a description track is needed.
Recording. Capture clean audio. Good sound is the single biggest factor in subtitle accuracy. Our guide to professional voiceover recording for Swiss corporate videos explains how to get a narration take that serves both the film and the subtitles.
Edit. Check contrast and size of any on-screen text, and keep it on screen long enough to be read. Avoid flashing sequences.
Subtitles. Generate a draft, then have a person correct names, terminology and timing in every language. Export as SRT.
Audio description. If needed, record it with a trained practitioner and mix it as a separate track or alternative version.
Delivery and embedding. Hand over the film, the SRT files and any description track as separate deliverables, and make sure the player supports keyboard use and captions.
The Swiss practitioners who specialize in audio description are few. The EBGB material is clear that you should involve them as soon as the project starts. Leaving audio description to the last week usually causes poor pacing and delays.
Common mistakes we see
Burned-in subtitles as the only version. Looks fine, fails the standard.
Unchecked auto-captions. A wrong product name or a misheard figure can mislead the audience.
Audio description added at the end. Narration squeezed into gaps that were never designed for it sounds rushed.
Accessibility only on the main language. In Switzerland, a film in French with no German or English subtitles excludes much of your own market, quite apart from disability.
Accessible video on an inaccessible page. If the player cannot be reached by keyboard or the transcript is hidden, the effort is wasted.
Our perspective: accessibility is a production decision
We have produced corporate, event, real estate, promotional and drone films for Swiss businesses, and one pattern repeats: accessibility is treated as a compliance task for the legal department, then bolted on. That is backwards. Subtitles, a script that describes what we see and clean audio are production choices. Made early, they cost little and improve the film. Made late, they cost more and show.
Our advice is to be selective, not perfect on day one. Pick the films that carry your message to the most people, build them properly, and extend the approach as your library grows. Be skeptical of any provider who promises full accessibility without asking what the video shows, who watches it and where it will be published. The answer to those three questions decides whether you need description, which languages you subtitle and how much budget to set aside.
We also think accessibility is a quality signal. A film whose narration can stand alone, whose text is readable and whose subtitles are right is a film that has been made with care.
— Pieter
How Tulip Films can help
If you are planning a new film and want accessibility in the brief from the start, our team can scope it with you: script, filming, editing and delivery, with subtitles and narration planned as part of the project. Our audiovisual production services in Switzerland cover corporate films, event videos, promotional ads and more, and we work with businesses and organizations in Lausanne, Geneva and across the country.
Our published packages are one-off project fees: Essentiel from CHF 600 to CHF 2,000, Signature from CHF 2,000 to CHF 10,000 and Premium from CHF 10,000 to CHF 25,000. See the video production pricing page for what each tier includes, then book a free consultation to scope what your video needs, including which accessibility features fit your project.
FAQ
Are subtitles legally required for company videos in Switzerland?
For government entities and state-concessioned enterprises, yes: the BehiG applies and eCH-0059 requires WCAG 2.1 level AA for digital content, including video. Private companies are not bound the same way, but the standard is the recognized benchmark and many clients adopt it voluntarily. If you are unsure where your organization stands, ask a lawyer who knows disability equality law.
Can I just use automatic subtitles?
Use them as a draft, never as the final version. Machine transcripts often get names, terminology and context wrong, and Swiss accessibility guidance requires them to be checked and corrected by a person. Budget review time for every language in the film.
Does every video need audio description?
No. If the soundtrack alone conveys all the essential information, as in a standard interview or lecture, description is not required. It becomes necessary when key information appears only in the image, such as a silent product demo, on-screen data or a visual walkthrough.
How much does audio description cost?
Swiss federal guidance estimates about CHF 50 to 100 per minute for script and recording, plus around CHF 15 per minute for integration into the audio track. Minimum surcharges on small projects and volume discounts on long ones can change the total, so request quotes from specialized providers.
Why shouldn’t subtitles be burned into the video?
A separate SRT file can be read by screen readers, switched on or off by the viewer, translated and indexed by search engines. Burned-in text offers none of that. Keep the SRT as the master and export a burned-in copy only for platforms where it performs better.
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