We are starting to learn what the biggest changes and improvements introduced with WordPress 7.0 will be, including shared editing, new blocks, and PHP support.
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Program transcript
Hello, I’m Alicia Ireland, and you’re listening to WPpodcast, bringing the weekly news from the WordPress Community.
In this episode, you’ll find the information from January 19 to 25, 2026.
Where is WordPress heading? This is probably one of the most common questions asked by anyone who uses WordPress or is even slightly involved in the community, and it seems that, at least, we now have some answers about what is planned for 2026.
For this year, everything is focused on generating and maintaining momentum within the WordPress community, building on what already works and making it easier for more people to participate actively. Leadership is looking for clarity around priorities and contribution paths, reducing friction and turning community energy into sustained progress.
For Core, the plan is to return to three major releases per year, starting with WordPress 7.0 at WordCamp Asia, and introducing significant improvements such as real time collaborative editing, APIs for AI assistants compatible with multiple providers, client side media processing, and expanded adaptive design controls.
Beyond technical development, the initiative places strong emphasis on strengthening the community, education, and the contribution pipeline. The goal is to reinforce Meetups as an active entry point into contribution, with hands on activities and sessions focused on real world problems. Educational programs such as WordPress Credits and Campus Connect are scaling up to attract and prepare new contributors, alongside clearer documentation and onboarding paths, and mentors identifying beginner friendly tasks. The overall objective is to turn interest into real commitment, making WordPress a more accessible and collaborative project for people at all levels who want to be part of its ecosystem.
This clearly aligns with what has been observed since late 2024, with people leaving both Core and other less visible teams, and a lack of new contributors who, for one reason or another, do not see WordPress as an attractive project.
The strategy behind the educational initiative is interesting, but it may face significant obstacles in some countries where education systems do not allow collaboration with the Foundation, or where it is difficult to find qualified people to deliver that training.
WordPress 7.0 aims to be a turning point, or at least that is the goal, much like WordPress 5.0 was with the introduction of block based editing. Will real time collaboration and the introduction of artificial intelligence be enough to continue attracting talent and new sites?
Among upcoming releases, there is already a scheduled release date for WordPress 6.9.1 on February 3, 2026, and the branch is now open to move tickets and tasks toward a future 6.9.2. The current goal for both releases is small bug fixes that have been identified.
We also have a new release of the experimental Gutenberg 22.4 plugin, which introduces extended support for the Font Library in classic and hybrid themes. This makes it possible to enable and use fonts and global styles from the typography library outside of pure block themes, bringing advanced editing experiences to a broader range of users and more traditional designs.
In addition, this version expands Pattern Overrides with support for custom blocks, making it easier for patterns to infer which blocks can be partially synchronized from the server. This simplifies more robust and flexible pattern workflows for themes and builders. In terms of design experience and visual control, Gutenberg adds focal point controls to the Image block, making it easy to define the focal area in responsive images, and begins exposing experimental block visibility controls based on screen size, with rules and an interface to hide blocks across different viewports, enabling more adaptive layouts without additional CSS.
Regarding WordPress 7.0, we already have several notable highlights from the upcoming release.
Work on real time collaboration is entering a decisive phase, focused on defining a default transport layer that works reliably for most WordPress installations. There is currently an active pull request proposing a new synchronization provider based on HTTP polling, intended as the standard solution, while hosts will be able to replace it via a hook with more advanced options if needed. The primary goal is to find a practical balance that works “most of the time” for most sites, without relying on complex infrastructure.
We also have the Font Library, which, as mentioned, is expanding its compatibility to classic themes. In addition to centralizing typography management in a single interface, the Font Library can now also be invoked from the Command Palette, significantly improving accessibility and closing a long standing usability gap by making font controls more consistent and discoverable across all types of themes.
Visual revisions are still in an early phase, with a draft pull request serving as a proof of concept, supported by another that lays the technical groundwork for future work. While not finished, early testing already shows a clear benefit. They make it immediately understandable what has changed between revisions, reducing friction and bringing a strong sense of clarity to the editing workflow.
The evolution of block bindings will allow custom blocks to use Pattern Overrides. This removes a major limitation, as overrides in synced patterns previously worked only with four Core blocks, headings, buttons, images, and paragraphs. This change is especially relevant for agencies and enterprise environments, where reusable patterns with greater flexibility are essential.
One of the most requested features is adaptive editing mode, which expands on the work started in WordPress 6.9, where it was already possible to hide blocks, by adding the ability to hide them based on screen size. The implementation is directly inspired by the block locking experience, providing visual and interaction consistency. Both the List View and the block toolbar adapt to clearly indicate when a block is hidden in certain contexts, making it easier to understand content state while editing.
Pattern editing introduces a key change to the default behavior. When a pattern is inserted, it initially behaves as if it were a single block, simplifying its use and reducing complexity for common tasks. For those who need to go further, such as adding, removing, or modifying internal blocks, the editor provides an explicit option in the block settings to edit the pattern in depth, maintaining a clear balance between initial simplicity and access to advanced tools.
The Cover block includes a notable improvement, the ability to embed videos directly from a URL, without relying on alternative workflows. This significantly expands the block’s use cases, especially in real world projects where video content, such as YouTube videos, plays a central role in page design. The feature is already working in tests and represents an important step toward making the Cover block more flexible and aligned with common site building needs.
The Tabs block is being refactored to address identified friction and offer much more granular style controls per tab, although details are still being refined and small issues uncovered during testing are being fixed.
In parallel, the Breadcrumbs block has already landed and has shown notable maturity. A bug found during testing was fixed almost immediately, making it a particularly valuable and polished addition for theme authors.
The long awaited Icon block continues in active development, with work focused on integrating the SVG icon registration API. The current scope has been limited to icons exposed exclusively through that API, prioritizing a solid foundation before expanding functionality.
The Gallery block is close to adding lightbox support with image navigation. This improvement will allow images to open in an overlay viewer and navigate between them without leaving the page, addressing a long standing limitation of the block and significantly improving the experience for sites with photo galleries.
Work on adding adaptive grid styles is now fully complete, with all tasks closed, approved, and merged. Thanks to this improvement, the Grid block now automatically adapts to different screen sizes when columns are defined, offering native responsive behavior without the need for additional CSS.
The Core AI team is beginning to prepare for the WordPress 7.0 beta, which is now four weeks away, to decide what should and should not make it into this milestone. The goal is to prepare the WordPress AI Client, ship the JavaScript counterpart of the Abilities API, expand core abilities, such as settings and user management, and discuss how older versions will be deprecated.
They have also announced AI Experiments 0.2 as an iteration focused on editorial improvements and tooling. Highlights include AI powered excerpt generation as a new dedicated experience and the Abilities Explorer, an admin screen for inspecting and testing registered abilities from both core and plugins, and better understanding how they are exposed. Early direction is also outlined for version 0.3, with tools such as content summarization, featured image generation, alt text generation, and a refreshed interface with more modern settings.
On the Developer Blog, an article has been published offering a different perspective on theme development using Playground.
The guide details how to set up the working environment, import a theme from GitHub into Playground, apply changes in the Site Editor, and use the Create Block Theme plugin to write those changes back into the virtual theme files. Once ready, those changes are exported directly to GitHub as a pull request, making review and collaboration easier.
Another article covers using DataForm on plugin settings pages, taking advantage of a modern, declarative approach. Instead of importing and assembling multiple individual components for each field, such as text controls or checkboxes, DataForm allows all fields and the form structure to be defined through configuration. This greatly simplifies the code required to build settings forms and aligns the interface with modern WordPress admin practices.
The Community team has announced a new process for WordCamp organizers to request a recorded video message from Matt Mullenweg addressed to their event, helping respond to the growing demand for personalized greetings and messages for the WordPress community.
Requests are available only for officially listed WordCamps scheduled at least eight weeks in advance, and must be managed by the organizers themselves. Priority will also be given to significant events, such as first time editions, anniversaries, or major community milestones.
And finally, this podcast is distributed under a Creative Commons license as a derivative version of the podcast in Spanish; you can find all the links for more information, and the podcast in other languages, at WPpodcast .org.
Thanks for listening, and until the next episode!
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