On December 6, 2018, the update to WordPress 5 was released, which makes Gutenberg the default editor. If your WordPress website is not yet compatible with Gutenberg or you are currently rejecting the new editor for other reasons, this is no reason to despair. Fortunately, there are a few ways to avoid the Gutenberg editor - or at least delay it for the time being.

The major update to WordPress 5, which integrates the Gutenberg Editor into WP Core, was surprisingly released in December 2018 after all. The reactions to Matt Mullenweg's last-minute announcement - 3 days before the new release date - were anything but positive.

As there are still quite a few open tickets, WordPress users have been calling for the release of WordPress 5 to be postponed until January for several weeks now. In addition, WordPress 5 brings with it some uncertainties in terms of compatibility and a release in the run-up to Christmas is therefore being criticized for two reasons:

• Christmas is the most important time of the year for many store operators. Postponing the release until January would give them more time for testing and any problems that arise would have less serious consequences.

• It is to be expected that web designers, plugin and theme developers, hosters etc. will have an increased support workload after the release. This is also extremely unfavorable during the Christmas period.

If you haven't yet familiarized yourself extensively with Gutenberg, it's best to first take a look at our Gutenberg article and our e-book "WordPress 5 & Gutenberg - Update or wait and see?" to get your own impression of the new WordPress editor.

Can the Gutenberg editor be avoided?

Due to the uncertainties surrounding the update to WordPress 5, many WordPress users are asking themselves the question: "How can I avoid the Gutenberg editor?".

In fact, there are several ways to deactivate the new WordPress editor or bypass it completely (for the time being). So that you can make the switch to WordPress 5 at your own pace, I would like to introduce you to some of these options:

#1: The "Classic Editor" plugin

If you install the "Classic Editor" plugin before updating to WordPress 5, the Gutenberg editor will be automatically suppressed in the new version.

The "Classic Editor" plugin has two modes:

• Either it suppresses the Gutenberg editor completely and restores the interface of the classic editor.

• Or it adds links in the admin menu so that you can select the classic editor for individual posts or websites (just like you can currently switch between Gutenberg and Classic when the Gutenberg plugin is active).

With over 600,000 active installations, the "Classic Editor" plugin is the most widely used method of suppressing the Gutenberg editor. This is no surprise, as the plugin has been officially recommended by the Gutenberg core team in the WP admin dashboard since WordPress 4.9.8.

However, it was unclear for a long time until when the plugin would work. But since November 7, the uncertainty has come to an end: the "Classic Editor" plugin will be officially supported by WordPress until at least December 31, 2021.

Since the update to WordPress 4.9.8, WP users have been prompted to test the Gutenberg editor in the admin dashboard. If you are worried that this message will unnecessarily unsettle your customers, you can hide this notification with the "Dismiss Gutenberg Nag" plugin, for example.

#2: The "Disable Gutenberg" plugin

Another WordPress plugin that allows you to avoid the Gutenberg editor is "Disable Gutenberg". The plugin has been downloaded almost 35,000 times from WordPress.org and is active on over 10,000 websites.

The default setting of the "Disable Gutenberg" plugin deactivates the Gutenberg editor for all users of your WordPress website. You also have the option to disable the new WP editor for specific user roles or content types only.

Recently, you can use the plugin to deactivate Gutenberg for theme templates and for certain post/page IDs, among other things, and remove the "Test Gutenberg" message in the admin dashboard.  

#3: The "Gutenberg Ramp" plugin

The "Gutenberg Ramp" plugin was developed by Automattic - the company behind WordPress.com. In principle, it offers similar functions to "Disable Gutenberg", but is less beginner-friendly as it cannot be operated using simple checkboxes in the plugin settings.

On the one hand, "Gutenberg Ramp" restores the classic editor. Secondly, you can use the gutenberg_ramp_load_gutenberg() function to determine in which cases Gutenberg should be loaded (e.g. always; never; only for certain post IDs, post types, pages, etc.).

#4: Fix WordPress version

The "easiest" way to bypass the Gutenberg editor is ultimately not to update to WordPress 5 at first. Raidboxes, for example, offers the option of fixing the WP version with a single click and thus automatically skipping all major updates. However, this is not a permanent solution, as we only support the three latest major WordPress versions for security reasons.

Even if there are some ways to bypass the new editor, we would like to encourage you to give Gutenberg a fair chance. Because basically, we believe that the Gutenberg editor has great potential and will bring WordPress forward in the long term.

Conclusion: This is how we deal with WordPress 5

At Raidboxes, we will make WordPress 5 available for testing and early adopters after the release. However, we will carry out the automatic update later than usual. Normally, we install major updates 14 days after release. For WordPress 5, we will wait until the most important plugins and themes have been sufficiently tested on the new version. If you don't want to switch to WordPress 5 in the near future, remember to fix your WordPress version in your Raidboxes dashboard.

With this solution, early adopters and curious webmasters can quickly use and test the new WordPress version without jeopardizing the stability of their customers' websites.

Would you like to discuss WordPress 5, the Gutenberg editor and other WordPress-related topics? Then head straight over to our Raidboxes Slack community for WP professionals!