From the beginning, Adobe XD was built to make designing experiences more accessible through intuitive, easy-to-use tools. Today, the prototyping app is taking another major leap forward in accessibility by adding support for macOS Voice Control.
Voice Control was announced last June at WWDC and shipped with macOS Catalina. Located inside the Accessibility pane of System Preferences, Voice Control allows users with physical or motor disabilities to interact with their Mac in a whole new way.
The February 2020 release of Adobe XD adds rich support for Voice Control with enhanced labeling of features in the XD interface. Adobe says you’ll be able to access all of the core features of the app, including prototyping interactions in Prototype mode.
Voice Control can be configured to create custom commands for quick access to menu items, like grouping selected objects and converting them into a component. Here’s how to enable the feature and put it to work:
Adobe commented on the importance of prioritizing accessibility features in XD:
Voice Control can also be used to create prototype interactions in Prototype mode. With two artboards ready, say “Click Prototype,” and then use Voice Control’s grid to target the “+” button in the Interactions section in the Property Inspector. Then, you can select the target artboard, configure any options using the names of the menu items, and say “Click Desktop Preview” to preview your prototype. Support with macOS works for multiple languages, as long as the OS language and XD language are set to the same language.
The February 2020 release of XD adds a few more workflow improvements and features for enterprise customers. You can read about everything new on Adobe’s website, and learn more about Voice Control in our getting started guide. The update is available to all Creative Cloud subscribers starting today.
