Artifact

An artifact is the PDF format's term for content that is deliberately hidden from assistive technology: running headers and footers, page numbers, watermarks, background images, and decorative lines and shapes. A screen reader skips artifacts completely - they are not read aloud and cannot be turned back on by the reader - while the page looks exactly the same.

Marking decoration as an artifact is required, not optional: in a tagged PDF, every visible mark must either be tagged as real content or marked as an artifact, so nothing is left for a screen reader to stumble over without context. The PDF/UA standard additionally requires running headers and footers to be classified as pagination artifacts.

In Silktide, you can see everything a document hides this way using Show hidden decoration on the Review tab - see Hidden decoration.

Learn more

• Tagged PDF Best Practice Guide: Syntax - PDF Association guidance covering artifacts
• Tagged PDF
• PDF/UA