WordPress News Roundup July 2020: WordPress 5.5 Betas Arrive as WordCamp US 2020 Is Cancelled

July 2020 was dominated by WordPress 5.5. Four betas and a release candidate landed during the month, and with them a list of features users had requested for years: automatic updates for plugins and themes, updates by uploading a ZIP file, XML sitemaps, lazy-loaded images, block patterns and a Block Directory inside the editor.

The community side of the month was more sobering. In-person WordPress events were suspended for the rest of 2020, WordCamp US cancelled its online event, and WordCamp Europe confirmed that 2021 would also be virtual. Here is the full picture.

Mergers, Acquisitions, and Investments

• WordProof wins €1 million grant (July 6): Dutch startup WordProof received a €1 million EU grant to develop its blockchain timestamping concept for content.
• Angry Creative acquires Pragmatic (July 17): The Swedish WooCommerce agency bought and merged with Pragmatic, one of the UK’s best-known WordPress agencies.
• Jetpack CRM: Zero BS CRM, acquired by Automattic in 2019, was relaunched as Jetpack CRM on July 22.
• ManageWP.org becomes WP Content: GoDaddy’s community news aggregator was rebranded as WP Content.

WordPress Core Updates

• WordPress 5.5 betas: Beta 1 shipped on July 7, Beta 2 on July 14, Beta 3 on July 21 and Beta 4 on July 27, followed by RC1 on July 28. Release was set for August 11.
• Updates via ZIP: After eleven years of requests, 5.5 will let users update a plugin or theme by uploading a ZIP, with a screen comparing the installed and uploaded versions.
• Navigation and widgets sidelined: The block-based navigation and widget screens originally planned for 5.5 were moved to a later release.
• Block patterns in core: The team settled on a set of patterns to ship with 5.5.
• Gutenberg 8.5 and 8.6: Version 8.5, the last release to be fully merged into 5.5, improved drag and drop and accessibility and allowed uploading external images. Version 8.6 added Cover block video positioning and updated patterns.
• Theme developer changes: 5.5 will allow theme authors to pass data to template files, and Hulu was removed from the list of supported oEmbed providers.
• 5.6 wish list: On July 31 the core team opened a call for 5.6 features, with an August 20 deadline.

Other WordPress News

• Events suspended for 2020: The Community Team suspended in-person WordPress events for the rest of the year and began reimagining online events.
• WordCamp US 2020 cancelled: Organisers cancelled the October event, citing pandemic stress and online event fatigue, and pledged to work on other formats such as a 24-hour contributor day.
• WordCamp Europe 2021 online: The Porto event was moved online for 2021, with an in-person event hoped for in 2022.
• Block Directory opens: Plugin authors could now submit block plugins to the new Block Directory, and guidelines were proposed.
• Documentation links: The docs team’s decision to ban links to commercial websites drew opposition and further discussion.
• Astra reaches 1 million: Astra became the only non-default theme on WordPress.org with more than a million active installs.
• Google Web Stories: Google launched a beta of its AMP-powered Web Stories plugin for WordPress.
• Gatsby integration: A new Gatsby Source WordPress plugin entered beta, improving headless builds.
• Unsplash plugin: Unsplash released an official WordPress plugin, then responded to concerns about image licensing, hotlinking and tracking.
• Admin menus for themes: The Themes Team asked for feedback on whether themes should be allowed a top-level admin menu item.
• Translation editor criteria: The Polyglots team finalised vetting criteria for translation editors and locale managers.
• WP Notify: The notifications project moved to its build phase.

Security Alerts and Plugin Vulnerabilities

• All in One SEO Pack: A stored XSS vulnerability affecting around 2 million users was patched in mid-July.
• wpDiscuz: On July 28, Wordfence disclosed a critical arbitrary file upload flaw in the wpDiscuz comments plugin that could allow unauthenticated attackers to execute code on the server.
• Adning Advertising: Critical vulnerabilities, including an unauthenticated file upload, were patched on July 8.
• KingComposer: A reflected XSS flaw affecting about 100,000 sites was fixed.
• TC Custom JavaScript: A high-severity vulnerability was patched on July 21.

Industry Trends and Insights

• Core absorbs plugin features: Sitemaps, lazy loading and auto-updates were all jobs once handled by plugins. 5.5 showed core taking responsibility for more of the basics.
• Online fatigue: WordCamp US’s cancellation acknowledged that a straight move online did not suit every event or every community.
• Mobile-first indexing delayed: Google pushed its mobile-first indexing deadline to March 2021.
• Bing courts WordPress: Bing launched a URL submission plugin for WordPress, another search engine competing for WordPress publishers’ attention.

Theme of the Month: Astra

Astra passed one million active installs in July, a first for a theme that is not bundled with WordPress. Its lightweight base, starter templates and page builder compatibility had made it a default choice for many freelancers and agencies.

Plugin of the Month: Jetpack CRM

Relaunched under the Jetpack brand in July, Jetpack CRM brought contact management, invoices and quotes into WordPress for entrepreneurs and small businesses. It showed Automattic broadening Jetpack from security and performance into business tools.

Host of the Month: DreamHost

DreamHost, one of the hosts recommended on WordPress.org, offered managed WordPress plans for small businesses and bloggers. With auto-updates for plugins and themes coming in 5.5, hosts that handled core updates reliably were well placed to help customers adopt the new options.

Founder of the Month: Sujay Pawar

Sujay Pawar co-founded Brainstorm Force, the company behind Astra. Reaching a million active installs in July made Astra one of the most successful commercial theme businesses in WordPress, built from India and serving users worldwide.

Looking Ahead to August 2020

WordPress 5.5 is scheduled for release on August 11, with a second release candidate expected in early August. Plugin authors should watch for problems caused by the removal of jQuery Migrate. Planning for WordPress 5.6, to be led by an all-women release squad, will begin after the release, and Gutenberg 8.7 is due.

Site owners should take the chance to try the release candidates on a staging copy before August 11.