WordPress 5.9 is the third of four planned major updates for WordPress in 2021, but it was only released in January 2022. We took a look at WordPress 5.9 and show you everything you can expect in the new version and what you should look out for in this article.
New major updates to WordPress are always hotly debated weeks before they are released. This is also the case with WordPress 5.9, on which work officially began on June 30, 2021. Expectations for the update were high, but not all of the planned changes made it into the release.
Release of WordPress 5.9 postponed
The original plan was to release WordPress 5.9 in September 2021, followed by the major update to WordPress 6.0 in December 2021. This schedule has since been postponed. Work on WordPress 5.9 began at the end of June 2021 and the first betas were not released until the end of November. The release of the major update was postponed to the end of January 2022.
This meant that there were only two major releases of WordPress in 2021 (WordPress 5.7 and WordPress 5.8). The delay is due to full site editing, which gives users the opportunity to design the entire WordPress site with blocks from Gutenberg. Read more about this in our article All about Gutenberg & WordPress Full Site Editing.
WordPress developer Tonya Mork writes on the postponement that it is the team's aim to release the new features for WordPress 5.9 in one piece and not split up. For this reason, it was necessary to postpone the betas (and therefore further development).
Overview: What's changing with WordPress 5.9?
With WordPress 5.9, WordPress is pursuing one main goal: to further advance full site editing. This goal has already been pursued throughout the last few major updates. For example, we have already seen the introduction of blocks in the widget areas in WordPress 5.8. Since then, you can use blocks to design the sidebar, footer or other theme-specific widget areas.
So let's take a closer look at what changes you can expect in WordPress when you update to the new version 5.9 and what you should pay particular attention to when updating later.
Navigation with blocks
WordPress has already converted the content area (i.e. where you publish content such as posts or pages) and the widget area to blocks with Gutenberg. In WordPress 5.9, the navigation is the next major area of a WordPress website to be adapted.
This allows you, for example, to design your main navigation with Gutenberg and create your menus with blocks. You can choose from blocks that are very similar to the previous menu design: blocks for posts, pages, taxonomy (keywords and categories) and for individual links, which you can use to link to an external page, for example.
You can either customize your navigation under "Design" -> "Editor" or find it in the new menu item "Design" -> "Navigation Menus". This allows you to create individual menus for different positions. For example, you can use a menu for your page header and a menu for your footer.
WordPress 5.9 now offers a total of over 30 theme blocks that you can use to customize your website. This brings WordPress a good deal closer to full site editing.
WordPress Intrinsic Web Design
In the past, it was necessary to define so-called breakpoints at which a website would "switch" to a different format. For example, if you wanted to switch a website from the desktop version to the smartphone version, you needed a defined number of pixels below which the page "knew" that it should now be displayed on mobile devices.
With intrinsic web design, this should happen "from within" in WordPress 5.9. The relevant blocks are then automatically adjusted depending on the available space, which reduces the size of CSS and HTML and should therefore have a positive impact on performance. Of course, the navigation blocks already mentioned are also responsive, i.e. mobile-optimized.
Graphical user interface for Theme.json
Theme.json was introduced in WordPress 5.8 and is now to be given a graphical interface in WordPress 5.9, with which users can change certain styles page-wide.
This includes the color scheme, typography (font and font size) as well as the layout and individual blocks. You can find this function in the editor under "Styles".
New standard theme Twenty Twenty-Two
With the new major release of WordPress 5.9, there will also be a new standard theme. WordPress is always based on years, which is why the new theme will probably be called Twenty Twenty-Two.
Many external developers of WordPress themes often still try to suppress WordPress developments in order to offer their own solutions and go their own way. However, in the new standard theme, users will find all new features implemented in the best possible way as a kind of best-practice presentation so that they can experiment with them.
List view in Gutenberg
Work has also been done on the user experience. WordPress 5.9 now comes with a practical list view that is designed to improve the organization of individual blocks within an article.
You can clearly see which blocks are used in the article and can simply drag and drop them to a different position. This makes working in WordPress easier, especially when it comes to long and varied articles.
Further UX improvements
Other minor changes have also been made to the user experience. For example, there are now:
- A better block for galleries with more settings and options
- A focus mode in which you can work on your template without distractions
- The speed has been improved
- You can now select your language on the login screen
The latter is particularly exciting for larger blogs or websites that work with entire teams in different languages on one page.
What else was there? And when is WordPress 6.0 coming?
Of course, there are also many smaller changes in WordPress 5.9 that don't get all the limelight at first glance. These include, for example, additional design tools, improved editing of block themes, minor changes to icons and animations, a better preview of the permalink and - as always kept as vague as possible - performance improvements.
Overall, WordPress 5.9 doesn't feel like a huge revolution. We've already seen major updates that were much more spectacular than WordPress 5.9, so the anticipation for WordPress 6.0 is correspondingly high.
Outlook and conclusion: What to make of WordPress 5.9?
WordPress' path to full site editing is taking shape and with WordPress 5.9 it is now also taking over navigation. It will be exciting to see what WordPress wants to pack into the postponed release of WordPress 6 and to what extent it will further change the way we work with the CMS.
If you're interested in the WordPress development process and the planned features, you can find a list of the changes and lots more first-hand information about the new WordPress 5.9 at WordPress.org here and here. What is your opinion on the current development of WordPress? We look forward to your comments.
