axesCheck
Free browser-based PDF/UA and WCAG accessibility checker that needs no installation.
Jobs Accessibility
Operated by axes4 GmbH
Opens the vendor's own site.
Jobs covered
Open a task to see exactly what the vendor documentation supports.
Where your files are processed
Files leave your device
We observed a file upload to check.axes4.com.
Established, not inferred, and established from two independent places. The browser client posts the selected file as multipart form data to the relative endpoint /api/upload with a token and a language field, read directly from the site's own uploadForm JavaScript; the host is therefore check.axes4.com.
Separately, the upload form will not submit until a required consent checkbox is ticked, and that checkbox text states that the user agrees to transfer the uploaded document and the personal data in it to axes4 GmbH for processing. uploadEndpointHost is set here, which per the guide overrides everything and renders "Files leave your device".
What it does
axesCheck is axes4's free web checker for PDF accessibility. You upload a PDF in the browser and it reports whether the document meets the machine-verifiable requirements of PDF/UA, assessed through the Matterhorn Protocol, and of WCAG Level A and AA.
It is the web counterpart to the PAC desktop application and is built on axes4's axesPAC checking engine, so the automated verdict matches the desktop tool's, but the report is delivered as a browser page rather than a desktop project. Because the file is uploaded, it is the one of the two where the document leaves your machine, and whether that suits a particular document is a question for the organisation that owns it rather than one this page can answer.
Best for
Anyone who needs an accessibility verdict on a PDF without installing software, and users on macOS, Linux or a phone, where the PAC desktop application is not available.
Worth knowing
Your PDF is uploaded to axes4's servers to be checked. The upload form will not submit until a required consent checkbox is ticked, and its text says the user agrees to transfer the uploaded document and the personal data in it to axes4 GmbH for processing; the vendor also says it may store a document temporarily for troubleshooting and technical improvement.
Whether that is acceptable is a decision for the organisation that owns the document rather than a blanket rule, and it is the thing worth establishing before anything sensitive is uploaded. The free upload is capped at 10 MB and there is no batch mode.
And like PAC it only answers the machine-checkable questions, so a clean report is not the same as an accessible document.
Details, and where each comes from
Vendor statements, our own reading of their pages, and the things nobody has established yet, each answered separately. Where we have not confirmed something it says so rather than guessing, and a row nobody has established is greyed out.
- Versions covered
- Web
- Website
- check.axes4.com
- Requires an account
- No
- Watermark on the free tier
- Not verified
- Maximum file size
- 10 MB
- Batch processing
- Not verified
- Data residency
- Not verified
- Open source
- Not verified
- Self-hostable
- Not verified
- Licence
- Not verified
- Redaction
- No redaction feature
- Programmatic access
- None
- Last availability check
- Responded in 1317 ms 21 October 2026
Checked automatically by our own runner, not reported by the vendor. 100% of our last 30 checks got a response.
What the redaction verdict rests on
From the vendor's own documentation, read 22 September 2026. Not tested by us.
What that does not establish
The vendor’s own site was read on 22 September 2026 and contains no mention of redaction, sanitisation, blackout or whiteout. Absence from a vendor’s own material is not proof that a feature does not exist - it may be undocumented, or on a page the reading did not reach - but for a NEGATIVE claim it is the strongest evidence available, and it is weaker than a positive quote.
Recorded as such rather than presented as certainty.
What the vendor says
Claims are labelled rather than repeated as fact. Where we have checked something ourselves, it says so and shows when. Checked means we read the vendor's own page and it says what we recorded - not that we tested the behaviour, unless the note says we did.
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“axesCheck is a web-based version of the PDF Accessibility Checker PAC it will check PDF files to see if they meet the machine-verifiable requirements of PDF/UA (according to the Matterhorn Protocol) and WCAG (A & AA).”
Checked by us - the source says this Read 22 September 2026
Confirmed verbatim: "axesCheck is a web-based version of the PDF Accessibility Checker PAC it will check PDF files to see if they meet the machine-verifiable requirements of PDF/UA (according to the Matterhorn Protocol) and WCAG (A & AA)." The missing punctuation between "PAC" and "it" is the vendor's, and is preserved in the claim. Three things from the same page belong with it.
The claim correctly limits itself to machine-verifiable requirements, and the page goes further in the same paragraph: "Additional checks are recommended that only a human can perform - for example, whether the sequence of elements is correct, the tags correspond to the visually recognizable semantics, or alternative texts reflect the meaning of an image." The page also explains the relationship the other way round - PAC is "the extended desktop version of axesCheck (currently only for Windows)", and it exists so that a document can be checked "without having to upload it".
So the two products differ in exactly the dimension this index cares about most, and a reader who wants no upload is pointed at the desktop version. Recorded as the vendor's description; no control was run.
Standing: Re-read and matched byte for byte
Check it yourself: the source, the SHA-256, and how we checked
- From
- the text a browser renders
- SHA-256
- d8a02fe2529e08adb8439cb8892cf2bcef08159f45b986719cf220ba04f199d7
How we checked
Re-verified verbatim on 2026-09-22: https://check.axes4.com/en re-rendered in headless Chrome with scripts/render-page.mjs and the claim's wording found in the rendered text. Originally verified on 2026-09-21. sourceHash is the SHA-256 of the re-rendered text, held as rv-check-axes4-com-en-5c4ecc02.txt.
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“By using axesCheck, you confirm and expressly agree that you want and are allowed to transfer the uploaded document and the information and personal data contained therein to axes4 GmbH for processing, and that you bear the exclusive responsibility and liability for this transfer of processing towards axes4 GmbH and third parties. axes4 may temporarily store and analyze your documents solely for the purpose of troubleshooting and technical improvement.”
Checked by us - the source says this Read 22 September 2026
Confirmed verbatim. The text on the upload page carries the claim word for word, as one paragraph of a consent statement that continues "By using axesCheck you accept our privacy policy." Two things about it belong in the record.
First, it is a term a user accepts rather than a description of the service, and it is the opposite of a no-retention promise: the vendor states it "may temporarily store and analyze your documents solely for the purpose of troubleshooting and technical improvement". "Temporarily" is not a period - no retention window appears anywhere on the page - so a reader cannot learn how long a document is held, which is the only fact this tier exists to establish.
Second, the same sentence places the legal risk on the person uploading ("you bear the exclusive responsibility and liability for this transfer of processing towards axes4 GmbH and third parties"), which is worth showing plainly because it is a condition a reader should weigh before uploading a document to a checker. Recorded as the page's own wording; we have not tested the service and no control was run.
Standing: Re-read and matched byte for byte
Check it yourself: the source, the SHA-256, and how we checked
- From
- the text a browser renders
- SHA-256
- d8a02fe2529e08adb8439cb8892cf2bcef08159f45b986719cf220ba04f199d7
How we checked
Re-verified verbatim on 2026-09-22: https://check.axes4.com/en re-rendered in headless Chrome with scripts/render-page.mjs and the claim's wording found in the rendered text. Originally verified on 2026-09-21. sourceHash is the SHA-256 of the re-rendered text, held as rv-check-axes4-com-en-5c4ecc02.txt.
Each claim is quoted from the vendor's own pages. This section describes what we have and have not checked - it is not a judgement about anyone.
Sponsorship is distribution, not an endorsement or a promise of search rankings, AI citations, traffic, or sales. This listing is a free entry, compiled from published sources.
Related reading
- Checking a PDF for accessibility - what makes a PDF accessible, and how it is checked.
Other tools from axes4 GmbH
- axesPDF - Windows desktop accessibility checker and fixer for tagged PDFs, with PDF/UA machine checks and one-click repairs.
- PAC - Free Windows accessibility checker for PDF/UA and WCAG, with local AI-assisted semantic checks.
axes4 publishes PAC and its site, and has maintained PAC since 2023. PAC itself has existed since 2010. Source: pdf-accessibility.org imprint, published by axes4 GmbH , read 2026-10-16.
Compared head to head
- axesCheck vs PAC The same PDF accessibility checker, twice, from the same company.