[EuiToolTip] Fix NVDA/Jaws not announcing in browse mode

[weronikaolejniczak]

Reported by

@mgadewoll

Describe the bug

Raised on #9689 (review)

There is one thing I noticed, which seems to not be a regression in this PR but rather from before:
When using the screen reader navigation (arrowUp/Down, not TAB key) in NVDA and JAWS and then pressing Enter to focus the element, the tooltip is not announced. That used to be the case before the tooltip refactor. In JAWS the tooltip is not shown anymore.

Impact and severity

It's an a11y violation. It's not severe. There's no workaround.

Environment and versions

• EUI version: latest
• React version: -
• Kibana version (if applicable): -
• Browser: -
• Operating System: Windows

Minimum reproducible sandbox

N/A

To Reproduce

Using JAWS/NVDA:

1. Use arrow keys to navigate to the tooltip trigger.
2. Press Enter to focus the trigger.
3. Notice the tooltip is not announced after the trigger is focused.

Expected behavior

When using browse mode, tooltip is correctly announced.

Screenshots (Optional)

NVDA

before	after
Screen.Recording.2026-06-05.at.13.28.25.mov	Screen.Recording.2026-06-05.at.13.29.04.mov

JAWS

before	after
Screen.Recording.2026-06-05.at.13.38.17.mov	Screen.Recording.2026-06-05.at.13.37.38.mov

Additional context (Optional)

@weronikaolejniczak #9689 (comment):

so I looked into it and you're right, this is the result of the :focus-visible gate. The browse mode/virtual cursor is treated like non-keyboard focus. Really nice find 🙏🏻

Probably the best solution here would be always linking aria-describedby regardless of isVisible (?) but I'd need to think it through and actually test it out with several combos. So I'll handle that separately.

[github-actions]

👋 Thank you for your suggestion or request! While the EUI team agrees that it's valid, it's unlikely that we will prioritize this issue on our roadmap. We'll leave the issue open if you or anyone else in the community wants to implement it by contributing to EUI. If not, this issue will auto close in one year.

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