The most anticipated WordPress 5.0 release ever is now available, after a series of beta releases and RCs. The community has been eagerly awaiting 5.0, mainly because of Gutenberg, the new block editor, and other new features like the Twenty Nineteen theme.
Users who are already familiar with the beta and RC versions can now make the final upgrade from their WordPress Dashboard, or download it from wordpress.org.
– How to upgrade to WordPress 5.0?
– WordPress 5.0 Speed Analysis
– Gutenberg, the new Block Editor
-Features
-Security updates
-Front-end Editor
-Mobile Optimization
-Crop background image
-New WordPress theme – Twenty Nineteen
-Best base themes
-User perspective
How to Upgrade to WordPress 5.0?
For cloudways users
If you are a user of cloudways, you can upgrade to 5.0 safely by using the application manager of your cloudways platform, and creating the environment as shown in the image below
For those who do not use cloudways
You can instantly test WordPress on the platform Cloudways, here.
Simply create an account and log in to the platform, launch a server with WordPress installed in just a few clicks.
From the DashBoard navigate to Updates and click “Update Now” to upgrade to 5.0
New users can test existing sites on WordPress 5.0 using the plugin Migrator. After the migration, simply log in to your WordPress dashboard and update to WordPress 5.0.
Note: If you are not testing 5.0 on your Cloudways environment, we recommend that you take a full backup of your site before upgrading. Once the upgrade is complete, run a compatibility test to confirm that your plugins and themes are compatible with 5.0.
Speed analysis
We tested 5.0 on the Cloudways platform to see if there is any difference between 5.0 and 4.9.8
Speed test
Note: To remove any bias, we used a previously released server without any optimization to reduce the impact on results.
Test environment: 1GB Linode server with a datacenter located in Freemont, CA USA.
WordPress 4.9.8 with Twenty Seventeen theme
WordPress 5.0 with Twenty Nineteen theme
The result shows that 5.0 works faster than the previous version, and is also compatible with cloudways, as indicated by reduced loading time and better performance.
The loading time decreased from 1.43 to 807 and the number of requests decreased from 18 to 11. This can be further improved by applying speed optimization techniques.
Guttenberg – the new Block Editor
Automattic introduced the WordPress Gutenberg editor in 2017 and since then, it has gained a lot of traction in the WordPress community.
The importance of Gutenberg can be confirmed by the invitation that appears in the WordPress 4.9.x Dashboard
It is an open invitation for WordPress users to test the Gutenberg editor, although they also have the option of using the classic one.
Gutenberg is the default editor in WordPress 5.0. However, if you are reluctant to use the new editor, you can also use the classic editor plugin. If you have no immediate plans to upgrade to WordPress 5.0 and want to test Gutenberg, you will need to use the Gutenberg plugin.
To test the new editor, navigate to Posts – AdD New and you will see a different layout than in previous versions.
Gutenberg Features
On the right there are two tabs: Document and Block.
-Document: Contains the most relevant options from the classic editor for publishing, choosing categories and uploading images, etc.
-Block: The new feature. However, if you have used a WordPress page builder before, you will be able to understand Gutenberg Blocks more easily.
Blocks are basically predefined templates for a specific section of the post. For example, the Table Block allows you to add a table and define the number of columns and rows.
Users can easily configure the table through Block settings.
Text style
The Gutenberg editor also allows styling and formatting, so users can set the size, text color, and background color of the text.
HTML Forecast live
Live HTML preview is a great new feature in Gutenberg that makes it easier to use HTML code within the body of posts and pages. This custom block allows users to add custom HTML code to the body of a post (where needed) and preview it within the editor.
Other key aspects:
-Built-in buttons that can be dragged and dropped anywhere within the post
-A separate block to embed social profiles
-word and block counter
-new alignment options via a specific block
-Table of contents and anchor support
A whole improved user experience, right?
Although Gutenberg is packed with new features, it remains one of the biggest controversies in the WordPress community. Users are reluctant to accept the change for one reason or another, but it won’t be wrong to say that the future of WordPress lies with the Gutenberg editor.
WordPress 5.0 Features
WordPress 5.0 now officially supports PHP 7.3, and the new JavaScript pack introduced with this release allows developers to add translatable strings directly into their JS code.
What's new?
Some of the most important features of WordPress 5.0
-Different base font editor can be selected for different language.
-Image and video blocks can be turned into an embed block.
-A complete draft of the post is saved when you click preview
-DateTimePicker component located
-wp-image-### CSS class added to allow using srcset and size attributes for images.
-All meta boxes are saved when the preview button is clicked.
-Only the meta that has been updated is saved through a recursive post-meta tracking method in the block API to avoid saving the base value for each registered meta.
Security updates
Since WordPress security has always been an important topic for the community, the WordPress team has been actively working on improving its security. They also recommend hosting services with SSL certificates, two-factor authentication, and application-level password protection.
Front-end editor.
WordPress users use front-end editors, or page builders, extensively. However, with 5.0, users can take advantage of lightweight and fast editors that inherit their functionality from the Customizer framework. It’s great for basic customization and formatting, but it lacks the advanced features that popular page builders offer (often for a price).
Improved mobile optimization
With 5.0, the emphasis has been placed on the mobile experience for all users. In this context, the new Twenty Nineteem theme is fully responsive and all previous themes are now also fully responsive. The goal of this initiative is to increase the page loading speed of base themes on mobile, ensuring better SERP results for these new websites.
Background image cropping
Users can crop background images before putting the site online, which significantly reduces the time that would otherwise have been spent on manually cropping and uploading.
Best base themes
WordPress has released a new theme, but that hasn’t stopped it from improving its old ones. This is great news for users, as they can expect updates to these themes as well. Themes from Twenty Seventeen to Twenty Ten will have updates for Gutenberg.
User perspective
Whenever there is a new WordPress release, the community’s reactions are mixed. 5.0 was no different, as it received a lot of attention due to Gutenberg.
It is essential to know what people think about 5.0 and the key elements behind their opinions.
The good
The not so good ones
Takeway
5.0 is undoubtedly a major update, but at the moment, it's hard to know if it will achieve the same popularity as its predecessors. It's still too early to have a definitive answer, and the community's decision is still unknown.
WordPress Workshop
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