FAQs

Short answers to questions customers ask often - searching, testing, data, AI, languages, and more. Individual FAQ articles stay out of the sidebar; find them here or via help search.

Title	Summary
Accuracy vs visibility	Visibility asks who gets mentioned; Accuracy asks whether assistants get your facts right.
Brand vs website	Brands are named entities for AI answers; websites are properties you test and improve.
Can I export results for stakeholders?	Yes - use CSV exports, browser PDF print, and tasks depending on the audience.
Can I review page headings in Silktide?	Yes - open a page in the Inspector to inspect the heading structure.
Can I switch between Silktide 4 and Silktide 5?	Yes - choose Back to original Silktide in the account menu; your data is shared between both versions.
Can I use Silktide with my CMS?	Yes - Silktide tests any public (or authenticated) site; CMS integrations and Inspector explanations can tailor guidance to your stack.
Can Silktide monitor staging and production?	Yes - add each environment as a separate website, with authentication and allow lists as needed.
Can Silktide test intranet sites?	Yes, if Silktide can reach them — usually via allowlisting, VPN-free access for Silktide, a proxy, or authentication.
Can Silktide test password-protected websites?	Yes - via HTTP authentication in settings, or a custom login flow for form-based authentication.
Can Silktide test single-page applications (SPAs)?	Yes - Silktide runs a real browser and executes JavaScript, so most SPAs are testable.
Do I have to use Silktide AI?	No. AI is opt-in at the account level; most of Silktide works without it.
Does Silktide offer an on-premises version?	No. Silktide is a hosted cloud product, and there is no plan to ship an on-premises install.
Does Silktide offer EU or US data hosting?	Yes — Silktide runs isolated regions so customer data can remain in the EU or US as contracted.
Does Silktide replace manual accessibility testing?	No — it catches a large proportion of issues continuously, but real assistive technology testing remains essential.
Does Silktide respect robots.txt?	Not by default — Silktide tests for people, not for indexing by search engines. You control the scope with website rules instead.
Does Silktide store screenshots of my pages?	Yes - screenshots support reporting and investigation; they are removed when the website data is deleted.
Does Silktide test PDFs?	Yes — Silktide discovers PDFs, checks them, and can remediate accessibility with AI-enabled features.
Does Silktide work with Single Sign-On (SSO)?	Yes - Silktide supports SAML SSO for eligible accounts.
How accurate are Silktide results?	Automated checks are strong for objective defects; judgement calls and edge cases still need humans - and AI can help explain, not replace, review.
How can I reset my password?	Use Forgotten password on the Silktide log-in screen; the e-mail link is time-limited.
How do I change the interface language?	Open My settings and choose your preferred Silktide UI language.
How do I download my data from Silktide?	Export tables as CSV where available, print screens to PDF, copy user lists from Users, or use APIs where your plan includes them.
How do I enable Silktide AI?	An account administrator enables a provider and the features they want on the AI screen.
How do I exclude pages from testing?	Use the 'What we test' rules to include or exclude URL patterns for a website.
How do I fix issues faster?	Prioritise high-impact checks, use the Inspector and Agent, make decisions for accepted risk, and retest.
How do I invite a colleague to Silktide?	Account admins add users from the Users screen and assign roles.
How do I request the destruction of customer data?	Email privacy@silktide.com after the end of the contract (or earlier if needed); destruction is irreversible.
How do I request the removal of my personal data?	Email privacy@silktide.com with your name and account email address to request removal of personal data.
How do I retest a website?	Start a retest from the website in Silktide, or ask Silktide Agent to do it.
How does AI spell-check work?	Dictionary checking still runs first; AI double-checks unknown words to reduce false positives when the feature is enabled.
How does Silktide calculate scores?	Every score starts at 100, and each check takes points off in proportion to how widespread its issues are.
How does Silktide choose which pages to test?	Without custom rules, Silktide prefers shorter URLs and earlier links, so important pages tend to be covered first.
How does Silktide count pages?	Your page allowance covers unique pages; Silktide still tests each one on desktop and mobile where applicable.
How does Silktide detect cookies?	Silktide records cookies set while loading pages in a real browser; cookies that only appear after a click may need a configured interaction.
How does Silktide handle frames and iframes?	Same-site frames with their own URLs can count as separate pages; third-party embeds usually are not fully tested.
How does Silktide security work?	Silktide is a SaaS product on AWS with TLS in transit, authenticated access, and role-based permissions.
How does Silktide see websites?	Silktide loads pages in a real browser on desktop and mobile, so it experiences what people experience - not just raw HTML.
How long does a website take to test?	As a rough rule of thumb, plan on about one hour per 1,000 pages - with lots of caveats.
If I score 100%, am I fully accessible?	No — a perfect Silktide score is excellent progress, not a guarantee of full accessibility or legal compliance.
Is customer data used to train AI models?	No. API inputs and outputs are not used to train the provider models Silktide uses.
Is there a limit to the number of users on Silktide?	No — Silktide does not cap how many people you can invite to an account.
What AI models does Silktide use?	Grok, GPT, Claude, Gemini, and Mistral from SpaceXAI, OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Mistral: the current list, with a short note on each.
What AI providers does Silktide support?	OpenAI, Anthropic, SpaceXAI, Google, and Mistral. Enabling one permits that company to process your account's data.
What are user flows?	User flows teach Silktide to complete multi-step journeys so pages behind forms and wizards can be tested.
What can Silktide AI do?	Explain issues, run deeper page assessments, reduce spelling false positives, and work through Silktide Agent.
What does Silktide AI do with my data?	Only what is needed for the request is shared with AI providers; customer data is not used to train their models.
What does Silktide do with my data?	Silktide stores account, configuration, and tested website content so it can run tests and show results - hosted as SaaS, not on your premises.
What happened to tags?	V4 tags are now called labels, so they are not confused with HTML or PDF tags.
What happens when my page allowance is reached?	Testing stops discovering further pages for that website; pages already found are still scored.
What IP address and user agent does Silktide use?	Default crawlers use a wide AWS IP range; use a website proxy for a small allowlist, and customise the user-agent suffix if needed.
What is a decision in Silktide?	A decision records how you handled an issue - for example, ignore, approve or teach the spell-checker - so scores and future tests respect it.
What is AEO?	Answer Engine Optimisation - measuring whether AI assistants can find, trust, and cite your content.
What is AI visibility?	Whether AI assistants mention, describe and cite your brands – measured in Presence.
What is Analytics in Silktide?	Privacy-conscious analytics that shows how people use your sites, including AI-referred traffic where available.
What is MCP in Silktide?	A way for ChatGPT, Claude, Cursor and other AI products to use your Silktide account.
What is Silktide 5?	Silktide 5 is the redesigned product; V4 remains available and shares your data.
What is the difference between automated and assisted checks?	Automated checks can pass or fail without human judgement; assisted checks need a person to decide.
What should I do if a website will not test?	Check the URL, try a proxy for bot protection or location differences, and ask Silktide Agent if AI is enabled.
When was my website last tested?	Open the website - the sidebar footer shows when the last full test completed.
Where is the Silktide VPAT?	Silktide publishes its Accessibility Conformance Reports at silktide.com/vpat.
Which browsers does Silktide support?	Use a current desktop browser (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge, Opera, or Brave) or mobile Safari (iOS) or Chrome (Android); Internet Explorer is not supported.
Which languages does Silktide support?	Silktide can test sites in any language; spelling, grammar, readability, and the UI each have their own supported sets - readability is much broader in Silktide 5.
Why are my spelling results wrong?	Usually the page language is incorrect, the dictionary needs brand terms, or AI spell-check is disabled.
Why can page limits prevent PDFs from testing?	If a PDF URL does not look like a PDF, it may consume page allowance instead - and discovery stops when that allowance is full.
Why did my score change when the website did not?	Scores move when Silktide adds checks, you change criteria, sampling differs, or decisions and schedules update results.
Why does Silktide test with an iPhone 5?	Silktide still uses a 320-pixel-wide phone for mobile accessibility tests because that matches WCAG reflow, not because it is a modern device to design for.
Why doesn't Silktide offer an accessibility plug-in or overlay?	Overlays do not fix inaccessible sites; Silktide helps you find and remediate real issues in the source.
Why is Silktide showing different content than my browser?	Geo-targeting, personalisation, A/B tests, or bot defences often explain the mismatch - try a proxy or authentication.