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Navigate Lightning Experience Pages
Learn about the structure of pages in Lightning Experience with details for screen readers.
Required Editions
| Available in: Lightning Experience |
| Available in: all editions |
The examples focus on using Sales Cloud pages, but many tips are applicable to other products when you choose Lightning Experience.
We recommend that you partner with someone familiar with the Lightning pages used in your Salesforce org. Administrators can customize the display of tabs and UI options for your org.
We encourage administrators to improve the usability of pages for specific groups of users by removing unnecessary page content. Consider using the Lightning App Builder to create more simplified pages for screen reader users by omitting complex structural items, such as tab sets.
Page Header
The page header includes:
- Skip links
- Global search box
- Buttons for navigating to favorites and managing them
- Global Actions quick create menu
- Setup menu
- Notifications button, which launches a panel
- User profile button, which launches a panel
Skip Links
The top of each page has two links: Skip to Navigation and Skip to Main Content.
- Skip to Navigation moves the focus to the navigation section after the page header. The navigation section begins with an App Launcher button that launches the app picker. In most Salesforce apps, the App Launcher button is followed by navigation items that provide access to the main Salesforce objects, such as Accounts and Opportunities. In Console apps, the App Launcher button is followed by a link to a Salesforce object, a menu to select another object type, and a set of open tabs.
- Skip to Main Content moves the focus to the content of the current page and bypasses common links at the top of each page. For example, if you open Chatter, you’re placed at the top of your feed. This link skips both the page header and the navigation items.
For accessibility, every feed has a hidden Skip Feed link that you get to by tabbing. Skip Feed skips you past the feed to the End Feed tag. From End Feed, you can tab into the column that typically shows features like Einstein Recommendations and Trending Topics. Whether a Chatter publisher is present, the Skip Feed link follows the tab succession, Sort by, Search, Filter (if present), Refresh this feed, and then Skip Feed.
The Activities component on record pages has a hidden Skip Timeline link that lets you skip to the bottom of the activity timeline.
Global Search
The top of each Salesforce page has an editable combo box labeled Search Salesforce. Use this box to search your Salesforce org for records, files, Chatter groups and posts, and users. When you begin typing, a list of auto-suggested searches and records displays. Use the arrow keys to navigate the list of search suggestions. Or continue typing your search term, and press Enter to do a full search. When you press Enter on a suggested record, you go directly to the item. When you press Enter on a suggested search in the list, you go to a Search Results screen. On the screen, the search results are grouped by the object type, such as User or Group.
The Search Results screen is divided into sections, each marked with a heading level 2.
- The first heading level 2 is “Searchable objects from navigation bar.” This section contains links to narrow your search.
- Subsequent heading level 2s list the types of records returned. A search for Universal Containers can produce headings for Accounts, Contacts, Leads, and Opportunities.
If no headings follow the “Searchable objects from navigation bar” heading, your search didn’t return any results. If the search did return results, you hear the number of results when the page loads.
Favorites
The page header has two buttons for managing favorite pages. Use the first button to add or remove the current page. The button label is Add Favorite if the page isn’t on your favorites list. The label changes to Remove Favorite when the page is added. This button is disabled on pages that don’t support favorites.
The next button, Favorites List, opens a dialog that you can use to jump to a favorite page in Salesforce. The dialog lists your favorites and includes an Edit Favorites button. If you have many favorites, the dialog starts with a favorites search combo box, which is in focus when you open the dialog. Type a search term, or use your arrow keys to navigate through your favorites list. Press Enter to navigate to the highlighted favorite. Use the Edit Favorites button to open a new dialog where you can rearrange, rename, and remove pages in your favorites list.
Navigation Region
After the header region is the navigation section of the page. This section begins with the App Launcher button, which opens a quick view of the App Launcher with a View All link. Use the View All link to open the full App Launcher dialog that contains apps configured by your administrator. Use this dialog to switch between apps. You can also use the App Launcher to access a Salesforce object in your org.
| Standard App Navigation | Lightning Console App Navigation |
|---|---|
After the App Launcher are the main navigation items for the current Salesforce app. The app navigation items can be a mix of links to any item associated with a tab, such as Lightning pages, Visualforce pages, Lightning components, and object home pages, such as Accounts, Opportunities, and Leads. Some objects have menus associated with them. Use these menus to access recently used records of this object type and to create a record of this object type. |
In Lightning console apps, the App Launcher is followed by a link to an object home, or a Select link if no object is selected. The object menu is labeled Show Navigation Menu. You can use these controls to browse through records of certain object types. After these controls are your open Workspace tabs. Use arrow keys to navigate between tabs. Each tab contains an action menu button and a Close button. When you’re focused on a tab, use the Tab key to navigate to one of its buttons. In Lightning console apps, modal dialogs are limited to the tab that triggered them. So even if a modal dialog takes your keyboard focus, you can still navigate away from that tab. To start a “go to” keyboard shortcut, press Ctrl+Alt+g or Cmd+Opt+g instead of only pressing g. |
Page Content
After the navigation section is the main content of the page. There are two main types of pages, each with a similar layout: object home pages and record pages.
Beyond these two common page types, there are several unique pages, including Home, Tasks, Notes, Reports, Dashboards, News, Forecasts, and Chatter. Chatter pages include the feed, user profiles, groups, and Files. We encourage you to explore these page types and develop your own navigation strategies.
Record pages and Home pages can contain hidden heading level 2 assistive text for screen reader navigation. For example, the Tabs component, which can be found on both Home and record pages, has hidden heading level 2 assistive text, as does the Activities component.
Object Home
All object home pages in Lightning Experience have the same layout. At the beginning of the main content section is the List View picker. To select a list view, use the associated heading level 1 link. After the list view heading link, an object home page has several actions.
- Action bar, which can contain several buttons or links and an overflow menu of actions that you can take at the object level
- List view control menu, where you can create, share, delete, and edit list views for the object
- Display picker, where you can switch between a list view and a Kanban view
- Refresh button
- Edit button, to edit values inline
- Chart button
- Filter button, which opens a panel for filtering your list view results
After this set of controls is the list view, which is an inline editable grid. After you tab to the grid, press the Enter key to enter the grid. To navigate the grid, use the arrow keys or screen reader table navigation. Edit buttons indicate that editing is allowed. Use an Edit button to change the values of fields. If you’ve made edits, press the Escape key to leave the grid, and then press the Tab key to access the Save and Cancel buttons.
Record Page
The main content area on a record page begins with the object type, followed by the record name, which is the page’s heading level 1. After the heading is the action bar for the page. These buttons and links, and possibly an overflow menu, contain actions that relate to this record. The actions can include Edit, Delete, Change Owner, and so on. Most of these actions open and place focus in a modal dialog.
After the action bar is the highlights panel, which has top details about the record, taken from the object’s primary compact layout. Unless the record page has been customized differently, after the highlights panel, you find two lists of tabs (also called tab sets). Depending on the record’s object type, these tabs reveal record details, Chatter for the record, related lists, record activities, or anything else configured by your admin. Use these tabs to get information, activity, and collaboration related to the record.
Related Lists
Related lists contain information about records that are linked to the record that you’re on. All related lists and similar cards on record pages begin with a heading level 2 and are identified with the ARIA article landmark.
You can perform actions on objects and records inside related list cards.
