What is alt text and how should I write it for products?

Alt text describes an image for screen reader users and search engines. For product images, describe exactly what the customer needs to know: material, color, style, angle, and relevant visible details. Generic alt text like “product image” provides zero value to anyone.

What alt text actually does

Alt text serves three purposes:

1. Screen reader access: When a visually impaired user browses your product page with a screen reader, the image is announced by reading the alt text. “Image” or “photo” gives them nothing. A description of what the product looks like — the information that sighted users get automatically — gives them the same shopping experience.

2. Broken image fallback: If an image fails to load (slow connection, CDN failure, bad URL), the alt text is displayed in its place. Descriptive alt text means users can still understand what the product looks like even if the image doesn’t render.

3. Search engine indexing: Google can’t see your images. It reads your alt text to understand what’s depicted, which feeds into image search ranking, product page relevance scoring, and overall page content signals.

How to write good product alt text

The formula: [Color/material] [product type] [distinctive features] [view angle or context]

Examples:

• Bad: alt="img001.jpg"
• Bad: alt="product image"
• Bad: alt="blue dress"
• Good: alt="Midnight blue linen wrap dress with tie waist, V-neck, midi length, front view"
• Good: alt="Handmade ceramic coffee mug in sage green with handle, 350ml, dishwasher safe"
• Good: alt="White leather Oxford shoes with brogue detailing, men's, sole view"

The test: if the image disappeared and someone read only the alt text, would they have an accurate mental picture of the product? Would they understand it well enough to make a purchasing decision?

Handling multiple images per product

Most product pages have 4-10 images showing different angles, context shots, and detail close-ups. Write distinct alt text for each:

• Main shot: full product description
• Alternative angles: “Rear view of [product]” or “Side profile of [product]”
• Detail shots: “Close-up of [specific feature] on [product]”
• Lifestyle/context shots: “[Product] worn with [styling context], lifestyle shot”
• Scale shots: “[Product] next to [reference object] to show scale”

Don’t repeat the same alt text for every image — this makes screen reader navigation repetitive and fails to communicate the purpose of each image variant.

What to do with decorative images

Purely decorative images — background textures, divider graphics, icons used as decoration — should have empty alt text: alt="". This tells screen readers to skip the image entirely, which is correct behavior. Don’t omit the alt attribute entirely (that causes screen readers to read the filename instead), and don’t add “decorative image” as alt text (unnecessary noise).

The distinction: if removing the image would cause a user to miss information about the product, it needs descriptive alt text. If it’s visual decoration that doesn’t communicate product information, use alt="".

Scaling alt text for large catalogues

Writing alt text manually for thousands of products is a significant undertaking. Practical approaches for scale:

Template-based generation: Build a formula from your product attributes (color, material, style, category) and generate alt text programmatically. [color] [material] [product_type], [feature] — then review and refine for top-selling and high-traffic products.

Prioritize by traffic and revenue: Start with your top 20% of products by traffic. These drive 80% of the SEO and accessibility impact. Work down the catalogue from there.

New product workflow: Add alt text to your product creation checklist so it never falls behind for new additions.

Review existing assets: Many product information management (PIM) systems and Shopify metafields support alt text fields. Bulk editing tools can help update existing inventory.

Missing alt text is one of the most common e-commerce accessibility failures and one of the easiest to fix. For stores with image-heavy product pages, improving alt text typically lifts both organic image search traffic and product page accessibility scores simultaneously. A UX audit will identify how your current alt text usage compares to best practice across your catalogue.