Web Quality Audit

Web Quality Audit

Comprehensive quality review based on Google Lighthouse audits. Covers Performance, Accessibility, SEO, and Best Practices across 150+ checks. Includes browser automation testing with PinchTab for real-world validation.

How it works

1. Analyze the provided code/project for quality issues
2. Categorize findings by severity (Critical, High, Medium, Low)
3. Provide specific, actionable recommendations
4. Include code examples for fixes
5. NEW: Validate with browser automation (PinchTab) for real-world testing

Audit categories

Performance (40% of typical issues)

Core Web Vitals — Must pass for good page experience:

• LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) < 2.5s. The largest visible element must render quickly. Optimize images, fonts, and server response time.
• INP (Interaction to Next Paint) < 200ms. User interactions must feel instant. Reduce JavaScript execution time and break up long tasks.
• CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift) < 0.1. Content must not jump around. Set explicit dimensions on images, embeds, and ads.

Resource Optimization:

• Compress images. Use WebP/AVIF with fallbacks. Serve correctly sized images via srcset.
• Minimize JavaScript. Remove unused code. Use code splitting. Defer non-critical scripts.
• Optimize CSS. Extract critical CSS. Remove unused styles. Avoid @import.
• Efficient fonts. Use font-display: swap. Preload critical fonts. Subset to needed characters.

Loading Strategy:

• Preconnect to origins. Add <link rel="preconnect"> for third-party domains.
• Preload critical assets. LCP images, fonts, and above-fold CSS.
• Lazy load below-fold content. Images, iframes, and heavy components.
• Cache effectively. Long cache TTLs for static assets. Immutable caching for hashed files.

Accessibility (30% of typical issues)

Perceivable:

• Text alternatives. Every <img> has meaningful alt text. Decorative images use alt="".
• Color contrast. Minimum 4.5:1 for normal text, 3:1 for large text (WCAG AA).
• Don't rely on color alone. Use icons, patterns, or text alongside color indicators.
• Captions and transcripts. Video has captions. Audio has transcripts.

Operable:

• Keyboard accessible. All functionality available via keyboard. No keyboard traps.
• Focus visible. Clear focus indicators on all interactive elements.
• Skip links. Provide "Skip to main content" for keyboard users.
• Sufficient time. Users can extend time limits. No auto-advancing content without controls.

Understandable:

• Page language. Set lang attribute on <html>.
• Consistent navigation. Same navigation structure across pages.
• Error identification. Form errors clearly described and associated with fields.
• Labels and instructions. All form inputs have associated labels.

Robust:

• Valid HTML. No duplicate IDs. Properly nested elements.
• ARIA used correctly. Prefer native elements. ARIA roles match behavior.
• Name, role, value. Interactive elements have accessible names and correct roles.

SEO (15% of typical issues)

Crawlability:

• Valid robots.txt. Doesn't block important resources.
• XML sitemap. Lists all important pages. Submitted to Search Console.
• Canonical URLs. Prevent duplicate content issues.
• No noindex on important pages. Check meta robots and headers.

On-Page SEO:

• Unique title tags. 50-60 characters. Primary keyword included.
• Meta descriptions. 150-160 characters. Compelling and unique.
• Heading hierarchy. Single <h1>. Logical heading structure.
• Descriptive link text. Not "click here" or "read more".

Technical SEO:

• Mobile-friendly. Responsive design. Tap targets ≥ 48px.
• HTTPS. Secure connection required.
• Fast loading. Performance directly impacts ranking.
• Structured data. JSON-LD for rich snippets (Article, Product, FAQ, etc.).

Best practices (15% of typical issues)

Security:

• HTTPS everywhere. No mixed content. HSTS enabled.
• No vulnerable libraries. Keep dependencies updated.
• CSP headers. Content Security Policy to prevent XSS.
• No exposed source maps. In production builds.

Modern Standards:

• No deprecated APIs. Replace document.write, synchronous XHR, etc.
• Valid doctype. Use <!DOCTYPE html>.
• Charset declared. <meta charset="UTF-8"> as first element in <head>.
• No browser errors. Clean console. No CORS issues.

UX Patterns:

• No intrusive interstitials. Especially on mobile.
• Clear permission requests. Only ask when needed, with context.
• No misleading buttons. Buttons do what they say.

Severity levels

Audit output format

When performing an audit, structure findings as:

## Audit results

### Critical issues (X found)
- **[Category]** Issue description. File: `path/to/file.js:123`
  - **Impact:** Why this matters
  - **Fix:** Specific code change or recommendation

### High priority (X found)
...

### Summary
- Performance: X issues (Y critical)
- Accessibility: X issues (Y critical)
- SEO: X issues
- Best Practices: X issues

### Recommended priority
1. First fix this because...
2. Then address...
3. Finally optimize...

Quick checklist

Before every deploy

• Core Web Vitals passing
• No accessibility errors (axe/Lighthouse)
• No console errors
• HTTPS working
• Meta tags present

Weekly review

• Check Search Console for issues
• Review Core Web Vitals trends
• Update dependencies
• Test with screen reader

Monthly deep dive

• Full Lighthouse audit
• Performance profiling
• Accessibility audit with real users
• SEO keyword review
• Browser automation regression tests (PinchTab)

Browser Automation Testing (PinchTab)

PinchTab is a high-performance browser automation bridge for AI agents. Use it to validate your site in real browsers.

What is PinchTab?

• Standalone HTTP server — Control Chrome via HTTP API
• Token-efficient — 800 tokens/page with text extraction (vs 10,000+ for screenshots)
• Multi-instance — Run multiple parallel Chrome processes
• Headless or Headed — Run with or without visible window
• Self-contained — 12MB binary, no dependencies
• MCP integration — Native support via SMCP plugin

Installation

# macOS / Linux
curl -fsSL https://pinchtab.com/install.sh | bash

# npm
npm install -g pinchtab

# Docker
docker run -d -p 9867:9867 pinchtab/pinchtab

Start Server

# Terminal 1: Start PinchTab server
pinchtab
# Server runs on http://localhost:9867

Basic Usage

Navigate and Snapshot

# Navigate to URL
pinchtab nav https://example.com

# Wait 3 seconds for accessibility tree to populate
sleep 3

# Get interactive elements snapshot
pinchtab snap -i -c

Text Extraction (Token-Efficient)

# Extract text (~800 tokens vs 10,000+ for screenshots)
pinchtab nav https://example.com/article
sleep 3
pinchtab text

Click and Interact

# Get snapshot with element refs
pinchtab snap -i
# Output shows: e5: "Submit button", e12: "Email input"

# Click element by ref
pinchtab click e5

# Fill input
pinchtab fill e12 "user@example.com"

# Press key
pinchtab press e12 Enter

HTTP API

# Create instance
TAB=$(curl -s -X POST http://localhost:9867/instances \
  -d '{"profile":"work"}' | jq -r '.id')

# Navigate
curl -X POST "http://localhost:9867/instances/$TAB/tabs/open" \
  -d '{"url":"https://example.com"}'

# Get snapshot (wait 3s first)
sleep 3
curl "http://localhost:9867/instances/$TAB/snapshot?filter=interactive"

# Click element
curl -X POST "http://localhost:9867/instances/$TAB/action" \
  -d '{"kind":"click","ref":"e5"}'

# Extract text
curl "http://localhost:9867/instances/$TAB/text"

Web Quality Audit Patterns

1. Core Web Vitals Validation

#!/bin/bash
# validate-cwv.sh

URL=${1:-"https://example.com"}
INST=$(curl -s -X POST http://localhost:9867/instances \
  -d '{"mode":"headless"}' | jq -r '.id')

# Navigate and measure load time
START=$(date +%s%N)
curl -s -X POST "http://localhost:9867/instances/$INST/tabs/open" \
  -d "{\"url\":\"$URL\"}" > /dev/null
sleep 3
END=$(date +%s%N)

# Calculate LCP estimate (simplified)
LOAD_TIME=$(( (END - START) / 1000000 ))  # ms
echo "Estimated LCP: ${LOAD_TIME}ms"

# Check if < 2.5s
if [ $LOAD_TIME -lt 2500 ]; then
  echo "✅ LCP passing"
else
  echo "❌ LCP failing (> 2.5s)"
fi

# Cleanup
curl -s -X POST "http://localhost:9867/instances/$INST/stop" > /dev/null

2. Accessibility Tree Validation

# Get accessibility tree and check for common issues
pinchtab nav https://example.com
sleep 3

# Check for images without alt text
pinchtab snap | jq '.nodes[] | select(.role == "image" and .name == null) | {ref, role}'

# Check for buttons without labels
pinchtab snap | jq '.nodes[] | select(.role == "button" and .name == null) | {ref, role}'

# Check heading hierarchy
pinchtab snap | jq '.nodes[] | select(.role | startswith("heading")) | {role, name}'

3. Mobile Responsiveness Check

# Create headed instance for visual inspection
pinchtab instances create --profile=mobile-test --mode=headed

# Navigate to site
pinchtab nav https://example.com

# Take screenshot for manual review
pinchtab screenshot --output=mobile-test.png

# Check viewport meta tag
pinchtab evaluate "document.querySelector('meta[name=viewport]')?.content"

4. SEO Validation

# Extract page metadata
pinchtab nav https://example.com
sleep 2

# Get title
curl -s http://localhost:9867/instances/$INST/text | jq -r '.title'

# Get meta description (via evaluate)
pinchtab evaluate '
  document.querySelector("meta[name=description]")?.content
'

# Check for structured data
pinchtab evaluate '
  JSON.parse(document.querySelector("script[type=application/ld+json]")?.innerText || "{}")
'

Agent Optimization Tips

Based on PinchTab documentation:

The 3-Second Wait Rule

# ❌ Too fast - accessibility tree not ready
pinchtab nav https://example.com
pinchtab snap
# Returns: {"count": 1, "nodes": [{"ref": "e0", "role": "RootWebArea"}]}

# ✅ Wait 3 seconds for full tree
pinchtab nav https://example.com
sleep 3
pinchtab snap
# Returns: {"count": 2645, "nodes": [...]}

Token-Efficient Extraction Pattern

# Navigate + wait + filter (14x more token-efficient)
curl -X POST http://localhost:9867/navigate \
  -d '{"url": "https://example.com"}' && \
sleep 3 && \
curl http://localhost:9867/snapshot | \
jq '.nodes[] | select(.name | length > 15) | .name' | \
head -30

Why this works:

1. Navigate + wait ensures full accessibility tree
2. jq filter extracts text nodes only
3. length > 15 filters out buttons, labels
4. head -30 limits output (saves tokens)

Multi-Instance Testing

#!/bin/bash
# parallel-test.sh

URLS=("https://site1.com" "https://site2.com" "https://site3.com")
INSTANCES=()

# Create 3 headless instances
for i in {0..2}; do
  INST=$(curl -s -X POST http://localhost:9867/instances \
    -d '{"mode":"headless"}' | jq -r '.id')
  INSTANCES[$i]=$INST
done

# Run tests in parallel
for i in {0..2}; do
  (
    curl -s -X POST "http://localhost:9867/instances/${INSTANCES[$i]}/tabs/open" \
      -d "{\"url\":\"${URLS[$i]}\"}"
    sleep 3
    TITLE=$(curl -s "http://localhost:9867/instances/${INSTANCES[$i]}/text" | jq -r '.title')
    echo "Site $i: $TITLE"
    curl -s -X POST "http://localhost:9867/instances/${INSTANCES[$i]}/stop"
  ) &
done

wait
echo "All tests complete"

MCP Integration

PinchTab provides an SMCP plugin for Claude Code integration:

# Set plugin directory
export MCP_PLUGINS_DIR=/path/to/pinchtab/plugins

# Available tools:
# - pinchtab__navigate
# - pinchtab__snapshot
# - pinchtab__action
# - pinchtab__text
# - pinchtab__screenshot
# - pinchtab__evaluate
# etc.

Headless vs Headed

# Headless for production
pinchtab instances create --mode=headless

# Headed for debugging
pinchtab instances create --mode=headed

References

For detailed guidelines on specific areas:

• Performance Optimization
• Core Web Vitals
• Accessibility
• SEO
• Best Practices

External Resources

• PinchTab Documentation — Browser automation for AI agents
• PinchTab GitHub — Open source browser bridge
• Lighthouse — Google's automated auditing tool
• Web Vitals — Essential metrics for healthy sites
• axe DevTools — Accessibility testing engine

Combine static analysis with real browser automation for comprehensive quality assurance.