diff --git a/src/components/views/elements/AccessibleButton.js b/src/components/views/elements/AccessibleButton.js
index 06c440c54e..19150682f0 100644
--- a/src/components/views/elements/AccessibleButton.js
+++ b/src/components/views/elements/AccessibleButton.js
@@ -67,8 +67,8 @@ export default function AccessibleButton(props) {
     restProps.ref = restProps.inputRef;
     delete restProps.inputRef;
 
-    restProps.tabIndex = restProps.tabIndex || "0";
-    restProps.role = "button";
+    restProps.tabIndex = restProps.tabIndex === undefined ? "0" : restProps.tabIndex;
+    restProps.role = restProps.role === undefined ? "button" : restProps.role;
     restProps.className = (restProps.className ? restProps.className + " " : "") +
                           "mx_AccessibleButton";
 
diff --git a/src/components/views/elements/Flair.js b/src/components/views/elements/Flair.js
index aa629794ba..7d3d298804 100644
--- a/src/components/views/elements/Flair.js
+++ b/src/components/views/elements/Flair.js
@@ -45,12 +45,18 @@ class FlairAvatar extends React.Component {
         const tooltip = this.props.groupProfile.name ?
             `${this.props.groupProfile.name} (${this.props.groupProfile.groupId})`:
             this.props.groupProfile.groupId;
+
+        // Note: we hide flair from screen readers but ideally we'd support
+        // reading something out on hover. There's no easy way to do this though,
+        // so instead we just hide it completely.
         return <img
             src={httpUrl}
             width="16"
             height="16"
             onClick={this.onClick}
-            title={tooltip} />;
+            title={tooltip}
+            aria-hidden={true}
+        />;
     }
 }
 
diff --git a/src/components/views/messages/MessageTimestamp.js b/src/components/views/messages/MessageTimestamp.js
index 0bbb3f631e..5bfdc1bc26 100644
--- a/src/components/views/messages/MessageTimestamp.js
+++ b/src/components/views/messages/MessageTimestamp.js
@@ -23,12 +23,17 @@ export default class MessageTimestamp extends React.Component {
     static propTypes = {
         ts: PropTypes.number.isRequired,
         showTwelveHour: PropTypes.bool,
+        ariaHidden: PropTypes.bool,
     };
 
     render() {
         const date = new Date(this.props.ts);
         return (
-            <span className="mx_MessageTimestamp" title={formatFullDate(date, this.props.showTwelveHour)}>
+            <span
+                className="mx_MessageTimestamp"
+                title={formatFullDate(date, this.props.showTwelveHour)}
+                aria-hidden={this.props.ariaHidden}
+            >
                 { formatTime(date, this.props.showTwelveHour) }
             </span>
         );
diff --git a/src/components/views/rooms/EventTile.js b/src/components/views/rooms/EventTile.js
index 6f0d555d4f..3c7f3deec9 100644
--- a/src/components/views/rooms/EventTile.js
+++ b/src/components/views/rooms/EventTile.js
@@ -32,6 +32,7 @@ import withMatrixClient from '../../../wrappers/withMatrixClient';
 import dis from '../../../dispatcher';
 import SettingsStore from "../../../settings/SettingsStore";
 import {EventStatus} from 'matrix-js-sdk';
+import MatrixClientPeg from "../../../MatrixClientPeg";
 
 const ObjectUtils = require('../../../ObjectUtils');
 
@@ -545,6 +546,50 @@ module.exports = withMatrixClient(React.createClass({
         const isRedacted = isMessageEvent(this.props.mxEvent) && this.props.isRedacted;
         const isEncryptionFailure = this.props.mxEvent.isDecryptionFailure();
 
+        // TLDR: Screen readers are complicated and can watch for new DOM elements, but not
+        // changes to DOM elements. As such, we hack a bunch of conditions together.
+        //
+        // Screen readers do not react well to aria attributes changing dynamically after
+        // parsing them. Although readers watch the DOM, they cannot react to aria-hidden
+        // going from true to false. To work around that, we check to see if the eventSendStatus
+        // is something worthwhile for us to read out. We specifically don't want to read
+        // out pending/queued messages because they'll be read out again when they are sent.
+        //
+        // There's a small annoyance with doing this though: if we can't change the aria attrs,
+        // we need to track the entry state for when the component mounts. As it stands, the
+        // EventTile is unmounted/mounted when going pending->sent, and then a simple properties
+        // change is made to mxEvent for sent->null (the final state). We abuse this cycle to
+        // mute the pending state and react on the sent state.
+        //
+        // However there's then a bug where readers don't read messages from other people (they
+        // enter the component as eventSendStatus of null) - to counteract this, we look for a
+        // transaction_id under the unsigned object of the event. According to the spec, we can
+        // use this to determine if an event was sent by us (as it's bound to the access token
+        // which sent the event). This allows us to do a few checks on whether to speak:
+        //  * If the event was sent by our user ID and the eventSendStatus is 'sent', then speak.
+        //    We cannot check the transaction_id at this point because it is undefined. We can
+        //    make the assumption that 'sent' means this exact device is handling it though.
+        //  * If the event was sent by our user ID and the eventSendStatus is falsey (null), then
+        //    only speak if the event was not sent by us (no transaction_id).
+        //  * If the event was not sent by our user ID then speak.
+        //
+        // Note: although NVDA (a screen reader) does react to aria-hidden changing, it does so
+        // in a horrible way. Because multiple properties and DOM elements are changing, it reads
+        // the message twice when we limit the 'should speak' checks to just 'if eventSendStatus
+        // is null'. This is part of the reason for the complexity above.
+        //
+        // Hopefully all of that leads to us not reading out messages in duplicate or triplicate.
+        const sentByMyUserId = this.props.mxEvent.getSender() === MatrixClientPeg.get().getUserId();
+        const sentByThisDevice = !!this.props.mxEvent.getUnsigned()["transaction_id"];
+        let screenReaderShouldSpeak = false;
+        if (!isSending) {
+            if (this.props.eventSendStatus === 'sent') {
+                screenReaderShouldSpeak = sentByMyUserId;
+            } else if (!this.props.eventSendStatus) {
+                screenReaderShouldSpeak = !sentByMyUserId || !sentByThisDevice;
+            }
+        }
+
         const classes = classNames({
             mx_EventTile: true,
             mx_EventTile_isEditing: this.props.isEditing,
@@ -601,9 +646,13 @@ module.exports = withMatrixClient(React.createClass({
         if (this.props.mxEvent.sender && avatarSize) {
             avatar = (
                     <div className="mx_EventTile_avatar">
-                        <MemberAvatar member={this.props.mxEvent.sender}
+                        <MemberAvatar
+                            member={this.props.mxEvent.sender}
                             width={avatarSize} height={avatarSize}
                             viewUserOnClick={true}
+                            aria-hidden={true} /* silence screen readers */
+                            buttonRole={null} /* trick screen readers into thinking this is not a button */
+                            tabIndex={null} /* trick screen readers into thinking this is not a button */
                         />
                     </div>
             );
@@ -634,8 +683,12 @@ module.exports = withMatrixClient(React.createClass({
             onFocusChange={this.onActionBarFocusChange}
         /> : undefined;
 
-        const timestamp = this.props.mxEvent.getTs() ?
-            <MessageTimestamp showTwelveHour={this.props.isTwelveHour} ts={this.props.mxEvent.getTs()} /> : null;
+        const timestamp = this.props.mxEvent.getTs()
+            ? <MessageTimestamp
+                showTwelveHour={this.props.isTwelveHour}
+                ts={this.props.mxEvent.getTs()}
+                ariaHidden={!screenReaderShouldSpeak}
+            /> : null;
 
         const keyRequestHelpText =
             <div className="mx_EventTile_keyRequestInfo_tooltip_contents">
@@ -773,13 +826,13 @@ module.exports = withMatrixClient(React.createClass({
                     'replyThread',
                 );
                 return (
-                    <div className={classes}>
+                    <div className={classes} aria-hidden={!screenReaderShouldSpeak}>
                         <div className="mx_EventTile_msgOption">
                             { readAvatars }
                         </div>
                         { sender }
                         <div className="mx_EventTile_line">
-                            <a href={permalink} onClick={this.onPermalinkClicked}>
+                            <a href={permalink} onClick={this.onPermalinkClicked} aria-hidden={true}>
                                 { timestamp }
                             </a>
                             { this._renderE2EPadlock() }
@@ -797,7 +850,7 @@ module.exports = withMatrixClient(React.createClass({
                             { actionBar }
                         </div>
                         {
-                            // The avatar goes after the event tile as it's absolutly positioned to be over the
+                            // The avatar goes after the event tile as it's absolutely positioned to be over the
                             // event tile line, so needs to be later in the DOM so it appears on top (this avoids
                             // the need for further z-indexing chaos)
                         }
diff --git a/src/components/views/rooms/ReadReceiptMarker.js b/src/components/views/rooms/ReadReceiptMarker.js
index 2f7a599d95..4025a36831 100644
--- a/src/components/views/rooms/ReadReceiptMarker.js
+++ b/src/components/views/rooms/ReadReceiptMarker.js
@@ -211,11 +211,13 @@ module.exports = React.createClass({
                 <MemberAvatar
                     member={this.props.member}
                     fallbackUserId={this.props.fallbackUserId}
-                    aria-hidden="true"
                     width={14} height={14} resizeMethod="crop"
                     style={style}
                     title={title}
                     onClick={this.props.onClick}
+                    aria-hidden={true} /* silence screen readers */
+                    buttonRole={null} /* trick screen readers into thinking this is not a button */
+                    tabIndex={null} /* trick screen readers into thinking this is not a button */
                 />
             </Velociraptor>
         );