Summary

When you have Forms mode set to "manual" you expect to be able to force it by navigating to an element that otherwise would trigger forms mode and press the enter key.
For instance, if you want to type into an input you press "i" to get to it, then "enter" and Jaws goes into forms mode.
This does not work, however, when entering a grid.

Try this ARIA Authoring Practices data grid
I) Set Jaws forms mode to "manual"
II) Navigate to the grid using "t"
III) Press arrow down or tab to make sure you are on a cell inside the grid
IV) Press enter

• Expectatin: Jaws switches to forms mode
• What happens, nothing

The only way you can navigate the grid with arrow keys is to use Jaws key + Z to turn keyboard intercept off, but that's not the same as being in forms mode (Jaws announcements are different).

This works fine if forms mode is set to "auto" before you navigate to the grid.

To fix:
If Jaws forms mode is set to "manual" users should be able to navigate inside the grid and press enter to trigger forms mode.

(this was tested on latest build of Jaws 2026 with latest build of Chrome)