What to Expect from WordPress in 2018
Now the preferred CMS for 29% of the internet, WordPress is without a doubt the world’s most popular CMS. We’ll peer into the crystal ball to see what’s coming in the WordPress world in 2018. And there’s plenty to look forward to.
Gutenberg Time – There’s little doubt now that Gutenberg will be the future of WordPress, looking to completely modernize the publishing experience. But since its initial rollout as a plugin, community reactions have been polarizing, to say the least. While some see Gutenberg (and agree with Matt Mullenweg) as the pivotal point where WordPress allows casual users to manipulate the CMS with developer-esque powers, others are anticipating massive challenges for plugin/theme developers, agencies building sites for customers, and ecommerce sites that thrive on the platform. One thing is for certain: Asking (and answering) the big questions now will only pay off in the future.
WordPress 5.0 – It doesn’t feel that long ago that WordPress 4.0 arrived (nearly 3 years ago), boasting some much needed upgrades to embedding media and an improved writing experience. 5.0 is expected to drop this year (with early estimates looking at June or July), introducing the aforementioned Gutenberg project to replace the content editor but also the Customizer as well. 5.0 will certainly come with a slew of usability improvements that will improve the the experience for content creators and, in turn, site users. We can’t wait.
VR site experiences – Now taking the gaming world by storm, virtual reality has gone from a plot point in science fiction to an actual part of our every day existence. While the WordPress VR plugin library is a tiny part of the whole ecosystem, expect that to change as the digital world continues its massive leap from inside a computer monitor to a tactile experience.
REST API – Initially introduced in WordPress 4.4, the introduction of Rest API proved a pivotal moment for developers looking to leverage WordPress. By opening up the CMS to push/pull data from mobile apps, cloud apps, desktop applications, and other WordPress sites (to name a few), WordPress finally shed its infant years as a blogging platform and grew up into an application platform. Expect more developments to come in 2018.
Big, Beautiful Themes – About that blogging platform. WordPress still powers amazing blogs, but it’s also the primary tool for both news sites and multimedia experiences. While the list of free and paid themes grows on a daily basis, this year we can expect theme developers to capitalize on Gutenberg’s block-based approach to content to create rich media experiences for users everywhere.
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