google docs and google sheets, VoiceOver or windows?

By Alicia Krage, 6 January, 2026

Forum
macOS and Mac Apps

For context, I'm going to be taking a course to prep for the CPACC exam. I was told yesterday that it involves Google Docs and Google Sheets, quite heavily, and that it's a little finicky with VoiceOver.

I wanted to ask the community for firsthand knowledge. Is it better to use windows with google sheets and docs, or is it okay to use VoiceOver on the mac?

Any tips would be appreciated! The course doesn't start until March.

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Comments

By Chris Smart on Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 16:57

Hi. I'm in the course as well, starting Mid-January.
May I piggyback off of your question and ask for any recommendations on great Docs and Sheets tutorials, if anyone has recommendations?
Or, should I just look up the usual lists of keyboard shortcuts and dive in?

By Alicia Krage on Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 17:25

Small world! I chose the mid March course because I'm traveling soon and may not have access to good WiFi. I hope it goes well for you!

You can absolutely steal my question! Hopefully people give us good tips.

By TheBlindGuy07 on Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 17:49

I've loved my mac more since I can confidently spin a windows vm in parallels just so I don't have to deal with the horrible accessibility of gSuite because of voiceover lagging so much behind and so much little bugs combined creating a horrible experience. Fyi even orca in google docs (haven't tried sheets yet) is simply so much better than voiceover, and there is obviously chromevox which is literally made for it, the most underestimated screen reader on the market imo. I hope aluminiumOS keep up to chromevox performance in terms of accessibility.
TLDR use a windows machine or vm. Even Paul got back to windows due to text editing nightmares on the mac. It's usable docs especially if you really want, but you'll never be as efficient as google suites technically allow blind users to be on windows, chromeos or even a decent actually modern linux distro.
HTH

By Tarja on Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 19:39

I recently finished Salesforce Administrator course in the Blind Institute of Technology and we also used Google Sheets and Google Docs all the time. They work quite well on Mac and I didn’t have problems with VoiceOver.
Make sure that you use Google Chrome. Also review Google’s official accessibility links for both Google Sheets and Google Docs. They provide lots of great information and keyboard commands.
I also installed Google Sheets and Google Docs on my iPhone so I was able to do things both on my Mac and iPhone.