Bridgetown is a progressive Ruby static site generator with 3.5K+ GitHub stars — modern successor to Jekyll with native Ruby components, esbuild asset pipeline, and Turbo/Stimulus support — but it has no built-in WCAG accessibility audit, no Core Web Vitals scoring, and no post-deployment health monitoring. PageGuard audits the live deployed URL of any Bridgetown site externally — free, no Ruby toolchain needed, results in 30 seconds.
ADA Title II Deadline: April 24, 2026
State and local government websites must meet WCAG 2.1 AA by April 24, 2026. Organizations using Bridgetown for government, nonprofit, and institutional sites face real ADA compliance obligations. Ruby component templates may lack proper ARIA landmark roles, ERB/Liquid partials can introduce incorrect heading hierarchy, Stimulus controllers may not announce state changes to screen readers, and community themes vary widely in contrast ratio compliance. Gem upgrades and component refactors can silently introduce accessibility regressions with no automated detection. PageGuard evaluates the fully rendered Bridgetown site externally without modifying your Ruby components or Gemfile.
| Feature | PageGuard | Bridgetown |
|---|---|---|
| What is it? | External website health monitor — scans any URL for performance, accessibility, SEO, and best practices | Progressive Ruby static site generator built as a modern successor to Jekyll — Webpack/esbuild asset bundler, Liquid/ERB/Serbea template engines, native Ruby components (Bridgetown Components), full-stack Roda application mode, Turbo/Stimulus integration, incremental builds, 3.5K+ GitHub stars; positioned as the Ruby community's answer to modern JavaScript-first SSGs |
| Free tier | ✓ Yes — unlimited one-off scans, no signup required | Free and open source (MIT license); requires Ruby 3.1+, Bundler, and Node.js for asset bundling; install via gem install bridgetown; scaffold a new site with bridgetown new mysite; run bridgetown start for live-reload development; bridgetown build outputs to output/ directory; deploy static output to Netlify, Vercel, Render, GitHub Pages, or any CDN |
| Accessibility audit (WCAG / ADA) | ✓ Yes — WCAG 2.1 AA scored 0–100 with specific issue list | No — Bridgetown generates static HTML from Ruby components, Liquid/ERB templates, and Markdown content but has no built-in WCAG or ADA accessibility auditing; accessibility quality depends entirely on the chosen theme or starter template, how Ruby components manage ARIA attributes and heading hierarchy, the markup generated by Liquid/ERB partials, and whether component authors have followed accessibility best practices in their template markup |
| Technical SEO audit | ✓ Yes — meta tags, headings, canonical, structured data | No — Bridgetown has no built-in technical SEO audit; the bridgetown-seo-tag plugin (ported from Jekyll) generates meta tags, Open Graph, Twitter Cards, and JSON-LD from front matter data; canonical URLs require explicit configuration; sitemap generation requires bridgetown-sitemap plugin; no automated audit of rendered output for missing tags, duplicate titles, or structured data validity |
| Performance audit (Core Web Vitals) | ✓ Yes — LCP, CLS, FCP scored 0–100 per scan | No — Bridgetown outputs static HTML/CSS/JS with no built-in Core Web Vitals measurement; performance depends on the esbuild/Webpack asset pipeline configuration, image optimization, chosen CSS framework, any JavaScript libraries loaded via import maps or bundled assets, and CDN/hosting delivery speed; no automated LCP, CLS, or FCP scoring for deployed Bridgetown sites |
| Ruby-native progressive SSG | No — PageGuard is a monitoring tool, not a site generator | ✓ Yes — Bridgetown's primary advantage is native Ruby: components as plain Ruby classes with ERB templates, full Ruby object model for data and content, Roda plugin for adding dynamic server routes alongside static pages, ActiveRecord for database-backed content, first-class support for Turbo and Stimulus for progressive enhancement; designed for Ruby developers who want the ergonomics of Rails conventions in a static/hybrid site context |
| Modern asset pipeline | No — PageGuard is a standalone monitoring service | ✓ Yes — esbuild by default for fast JS/CSS bundling; Webpack 5 available; PostCSS for CSS transforms; import maps support; Sass/SCSS; hot module replacement in development; content hash fingerprinting for production assets; Ruby Gems ecosystem integration; Stimulus controllers auto-loaded; Turbo for SPA-like navigation without full JS frameworks |
| Automated website monitoring | ✓ Yes — weekly or daily scans with email alerts on score drop | No — Bridgetown is a static site generator; it has no post-deployment health monitoring, accessibility regression alerts, uptime checks, or score tracking for the sites it builds |
| AI-generated plain-English report | ✓ Yes — explains issues in non-technical language | No — no AI health report for sites built with Bridgetown |
| ADA Title II compliance monitoring | ✓ Yes — WCAG audit + alert on accessibility regression | No — Bridgetown does not audit or alert on WCAG compliance; accessibility issues common in Bridgetown sites include: Ruby component templates generated without ARIA landmark roles, ERB partials and Liquid includes that produce incorrect heading hierarchy across layouts, bridgetown-seo-tag meta output not including accessibility-relevant structured data, Stimulus controllers managing UI state without announcing changes to screen readers via ARIA live regions, import map-loaded JavaScript components that introduce keyboard focus traps or missing focus management, and color contrast issues in starter templates and community-maintained themes — all requiring external runtime validation on the deployed production site |
| Works on any platform | ✓ Yes — scans any URL on any front-end or platform | No — Bridgetown generates your own site only; it does not audit sites built by others or using different frameworks |
| Independent external audit | ✓ Yes — third-party scan, shareable URL for clients/stakeholders | No — no built-in tool to generate a shareable external health report for a Bridgetown-powered site |
| Instant on-demand scan | ✓ Yes — results in 30 seconds, no code changes needed | No — no on-demand health scan; external auditing of Bridgetown sites requires separate tools like Lighthouse or axe after deployment |
| Multi-site dashboard | ✓ Yes — 1–50 sites depending on plan | Bridgetown builds individual sites; there is no health monitoring dashboard showing accessibility, SEO, and performance scores across multiple Bridgetown deployments |
| Pricing for health monitoring | ✓ Free + from $9/mo for automated monitoring | Health monitoring not available — Bridgetown is a static site generator, not a website health monitoring tool |
Get the WCAG accessibility score and Core Web Vitals for your deployed Bridgetown site. Results in 30 seconds. No Ruby environment or Gemfile access required.
Results in ~30 seconds. 4 scores: Performance, Accessibility, SEO, Best Practices.
Yes — PageGuard scans the live deployed URL of any Bridgetown-built site and evaluates the rendered HTML output. Enter the public URL and receive a full health report in ~30 seconds covering Core Web Vitals, WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility, technical SEO, and best practices. No Ruby environment, Gemfile, or source code access is required.
No — Bridgetown generates static HTML with no built-in WCAG compliance checking. Common issues include Ruby component templates lacking ARIA landmark roles, ERB/Liquid partials producing incorrect heading hierarchy, Stimulus controllers managing UI state without ARIA live region announcements, import map-loaded JavaScript introducing keyboard focus problems, and color contrast issues in community themes. PageGuard audits your live site and provides a WCAG 2.1 AA score with specific issues to fix.
Bridgetown is used by Ruby developers and agencies building production sites — including government and nonprofit properties that face ADA Title II requirements by April 24, 2026. Gem upgrades, component refactors, theme changes, and new content additions can introduce accessibility regressions that go undetected without automated post-deployment monitoring. PageGuard evaluates the fully rendered page and provides continuous monitoring without requiring changes to your Ruby components or Gemfile.
No — they serve completely different purposes. Bridgetown is a Ruby static site generator with native components, a modern asset pipeline, and Turbo/Stimulus support — ideal for Ruby developers building production-quality static or hybrid sites. PageGuard is an external quality monitoring tool for the deployed output of those sites. Organizations building with Bridgetown should use PageGuard to continuously monitor accessibility compliance, SEO health, and Core Web Vitals performance after each deployment.