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Say goodbye to the hassle of manual file uploads and tedious deployments, and say hello to WordPress.com’s new GitHub Deployments.

With GitHub Deployments, you can seamlessly connect your repository to your WordPress.com site in just a few clicks. Now you can focus on what you do best: writing outstanding code. Each time you push a change to your GitHub repository, it will be deployed to your WordPress.com site automatically or upon request. 

Check out this video overview from Paulo Trentin, one of the developers who worked on this feature:

Here are three reasons why we know you’re going to love GitHub Deployments on WordPress.com:

1. A streamlined workflow

GitHub Deployments help you manage your site’s code in a reliable, predictable, and automated way using version control instead of older or manual mechanisms, such as FTP or SSH tools. In its simplest form, it doesn’t require a workflow file like our previous GitHub integration, which relied on a GitHub action; instead, you can connect and deploy in just a few clicks, all within your WordPress.com dashboard.

This is a welcome change for developers who want to simplify their code deployment process and migrate away from the manual operations and error-prone nature of SFTP and SSH transfers. 

GitHub Deployments also allows you to connect multiple repositories to a single site, encouraging code reusability between the sites you manage. Want to deploy a plugin or theme to multiple sites with a single branch push? Have at it! Want to manage your entire site’s code from a GitHub repository? We’ve got you covered!

2. Run checks and tasks

GitHub Deployments also gives you the power to process files and run tasks before transferring the files to your WordPress.com site through GitHub workflows. This helps ensure that all team members publish code following your chosen patterns and expectations, for example. 

If that’s your thing, you can install Composer dependencies and run any command supported by GitHub actions prior to sending any code updates to your site. Find a few of our favorite workflow recipes here.

Three cheers for unified, well-written code!

3. Deploy the way you want

You can adjust the deployment settings for each repository, giving you complete control over how your code is shipped.

You can choose to automatically deploy changes to your WordPress.com site as soon as code is committed to your repository, or you can request deployments manually. Manual deployments give you the most control over when your code changes are pushed live, as you’ll use the GitHub Deployments interface to trigger a deployment. We recommend manual deployments if you don’t want to use a staging site.

In general, automatic deployments are not recommended for live production sites, as any changes to the code in the repository are automatically deployed from GitHub to the live site. Instead, you may decide to automatically deploy first to a staging site and then sync the staging site to production once you’re ready.

That said, choose your own adventure and deploy on your own terms.

Do your thing, and we’ll handle the rest

Development on WordPress.com has never been easier. Say goodbye to manual deployments and hello to more efficient collaboration, streamlined version control, and the peace of mind that comes with knowing your project data is secure.

Get instant access to our new GitHub Deployments with a Creator or Entrepreneur plan (did you know we have a 14-day refund policy?).

Ready to try GitHub Deployments out for yourself? Click here to start deploying, and learn more by reading our developer documentation.

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Major kudos to the GitHub Deployments team on this launch! Paulo Trentin, Jeroen Pfeil, Kenroy Mcleish, Mike Kelly, Javier Arce, Jeff Sanquist, Alexa Peduzzi, Jeremy Anderberg, and our beta testers.

In this “Build and Beyond” video, Jamie Marsland re-creates The New York Times’ website in less than 30 minutes using WordPress.com. By utilizing mega menus, master layouts, typography controls, and post grids, Jamie shows us what’s possible with the limitless customizations available with WordPress.

When it comes to mega menus, specifically, it’s worth noting that this is a highly complex customization that should only be attempted by WordPress pros and is mainly shown here as a demo of what’s possible. Please read this blog post on the WordPress.org developer blog before embarking on your own mega menu.

To learn more and get started on your own site today, click below:

This year’s WordCamp Asia was held in Taipei, the vibrant capital city of Taiwan. Members from WordPress.com joined other Automatticians, as well as around 2,000 other attendees from across 70 countries to connect, learn, build, and give back to the platform that powers millions of top websites across the internet.

The event kicked off with Contributor Day, an opportunity for anyone in the WordPress community, from newcomers to seasoned experts, to get involved and contribute to WordPress. Contributing can mean contributing to code, but it can also mean sharing your expertise in design, offering support in forums, translating content, and much much more. This year’s Contributor Day had a fantastic turnout and it was amazing to see so many folks show up and participate! 

As always, there was a variety of informative and inspiring talks. Some of our favorites included talks about the future of WordPress, the multifaceted nature of design, building and maintaining WordPress sites with AI, achieving efficient workflows with the site editor, and the importance of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging in the tech and WordPress communities. If any of these topics pique your interest, you can take a look at the livestream recordings for these and all other WordCamp Asia 2024 talks here. 

While our colleagues from the WordPress Project, Woo, and Jetpack participated in the event, folks from WordPress.com were also present, contributing, networking, and engaging with the community.

This year we were particularly interested in connecting with developers so that we could better understand their experiences with WordPress.com. Our hosting infrastructure, powered by WP Cloud, is best-in-class, yet the benefits aren’t as well-known in the developer community. To help get the word out about all of our developer-focused features, we’ve recently relaunched our developer site at developer.wordpress.com. Check it out to learn about staging sites, WP-CLI access, and Studio, our upcoming local development environment. 

During the anticipated closing Q&A session at WordCamp Asia 2024, Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of WordPress and CEO of Automattic, opened up about his dreams for a web that’s both open and accessible to everyone. He shared how the core principles of open source are not just shaping WordPress but also knitting together a worldwide community of contributors.

That sense of community is something you can definitely feel at WordCamps. Thirty-six percent of attendees at this WordCamp were first-time participants—a testament to the event’s growing appeal and the ever-expanding WordPress community.

During the closing remarks, Matt revealed that State of the Word 2024 will be held in Tokyo, Japan. The lead organizers also revealed the next WordCamp Asia location: Manila, Philippines, in February 2025. With Manila’s rich tapestry of Spanish, European, American, and Asian influences, we’re in for a vibrant mix of culture, cuisine, and community!

But you don’t have to wait until 2025 to start getting involved. There’s a huge number of local and regional WordCamps happening year-round. Head over to https://central.wordcamp.org/ to find one near you. Whether you’re looking to develop your skills, learn something new, network with the community, there’s something for everyone. We hope to see you out there! 

Jamie Marsland has been preaching the WordPress gospel for over a decade and has trained thousands of people on blocks, plugins, and more. Through his popular YouTube channel and hands-on courses, Jamie provides incredible tutorials and breaks down the most common misconceptions about building with WordPress. 

We’re happy to share that WordPress.com is partnering with Jamie over the next few months to create a series of videos that will show you how to get the most out of your website experience. From exciting new feature announcements to handy tips and tricks to Jamie’s mind-blowing “website re-creations,” we promise you’ll learn something new in every video.  

Starting later this week, you’ll see those videos posted to both our own YouTube channel as well as this blog. Stay tuned!  

The second release candidate (RC2) for WordPress 6.5 is ready! 

This version of the WordPress software is under development. Please do not install, run, or test this version of WordPress on production or mission-critical websites. Instead, it’s recommended that you evaluate RC2 on a test server and site.

While release candidates are considered ready for release, testing remains crucial to ensure that everything in WordPress 6.5 is the best it can be.

You can test WordPress 6.5 RC2 in four ways:

Plugin	Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin on a WordPress install. (Select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream).
Direct Download	Download the RC2 version (zip) and install it on a WordPress website.
Command Line	Use the following WP-CLI command: wp core update --version=6.5-RC2
WordPress Playground	Use the 6.5 RC2 WordPress Playground instance (available within 35 minutes after the release is ready) to test the software directly in your browser without the need for a separate site or setup.

The current target for the WordPress 6.5 release is March 26, 2024. That’s a mere two weeks away! Get an overview of the 6.5 release cycle, and check the Make WordPress Core blog for 6.5-related posts in the coming weeks for further details.

What to expect in WordPress 6.5 RC2

Thanks to the many contributors testing up to this point, this release includes approximately 20 bug fixes for the Editor and 30+ tickets for WordPress Core. For more technical information related to issues addressed since RC1, you can browse the following links: 

• GitHub commits for 6.5 since March 5
• Closed Trac tickets since March 5

Update on content overrides for synced patterns

As synced patterns evolve and improve, every enhancement must continue to provide the best experience possible. With this in mind, WordPress 6.5 will not include the ability to override content in synced patterns. This allows more time for feedback and testing to ensure it can really shine. Expect this feature to debut in the next major release!

Contribute to this release

WordPress is open source software made possible by a passionate community of people collaborating on and contributing to its development. The resources below outline various ways you can help the world’s most popular open source web platform, regardless of your technical expertise.

Get involved in testing

Testing for issues is critical to ensuring WordPress is performant and stable. It’s also a meaningful way for anyone to contribute. This detailed guide will walk you through testing features in WordPress 6.5. For those new to testing, follow this general testing guide for more details on getting set up.

If you encounter an issue, please report it to the Alpha/Beta area of the support forums or directly to WordPress Trac if you are comfortable writing a reproducible bug report. You can also check your issue against a list of known bugs.

Curious about testing releases in general? Follow along with the testing initiatives in Make Core and join the #core-test channel on Making WordPress Slack.

Search for vulnerabilities

From now until the final release candidate of WordPress 6.5 (scheduled for March 19), the monetary reward for reporting new, unreleased security vulnerabilities is doubled. Please follow responsible disclosure practices as detailed in the project’s security practices and policies outlined on the HackerOne page and in the security white paper.

Update your theme or plugin

For plugin and theme authors, your products play an integral role in extending the functionality and value of WordPress for all users. 

Thanks for continuing to test your themes and plugins with the WordPress 6.5 beta releases. With RC1, you’ll want to conclude your testing and update the “Tested up to” version in your plugin’s readme file to 6.5.

If you find compatibility issues, please post detailed information to the support forum.

Help translate WordPress

Do you speak a language other than English? ¿Español? Français? Русский? 日本? हिन्दी? বাংলা? You can help translate WordPress into more than 100 languages.

Release the haiku

RC2, a bridge,
From development to launch,
One more step forward.
– submitted by @huzaifaalmesbah

Thank you to the following contributors for collaborating on this post: @dansoschin

Over 1,300 attendees gathered at the Taipei International Convention Center in Taiwan for WordCamp Asia 2024. This three-day event emerged as a vibrant celebration showcasing the collaboration, diversity, and innovation that drive the world’s most popular web platform.

The Asian WordPress flagship event started with a dedicated Contributor Day, followed by two days of engaging talks, panels, hands-on workshops, and networking. Notable guests, including WordPress Cofounder Matt Mullenweg and Executive Director Josepha Haden Chomphosy, joined the diverse lineup of speakers. Popular topics featured cutting-edge web technologies and trends, use cases, open source dynamics, and more. WordPress enthusiasts seized the opportunity to gain insights from international and local industry experts and to learn about the project’s future.

Converting walled gardens into community gardens

On March 8, Josepha Haden Chomphosy took the stage for an insightful journey comparing and contrasting the “walled” and “community” gardens in software ecosystems, drawing an analogy between closed and open source platforms. After exploring both concepts, she posed an important question to the audience.

What would it take for someone to move from a walled garden to a community garden?

Open source software, symbolized by community gardens, represents freedom from copyright restrictions and usage limitations. Unlike proprietary software (described as walled gardens), the core value lies in long-term empowerment, giving people control and ownership of their digital presence.

Acknowledging the longstanding values held by WordPress and its open source community for two decades, Josepha focused on the importance of caring for foundations that make us strong, managing what distracts us, and nurturing growth by embracing new opportunities. She celebrated the strengths of the WordPress community and how its shared ethos furthers a thriving ecosystem.

Quoting artist and activist Audrey Hepburn, Josepha expressed that, much like a community garden, the power of contributions—whether through time, knowledge, or product use— sustains and maintains shared spaces like WordPress.

In the Q&A portion of her presentation, Josepha addressed inquiries about community involvement and contributions. Highlighted resources included the WordPress job board for opportunities within the ecosystem and the Data Liberation project, emphasizing its role in fostering a more open web and helping the transition out of proprietary platforms.

Q&A with Matt Mullenweg

WordCamp Asia concluded with a live audience Q&A session featuring WordPress Cofounder Matt Mullenweg. Attendees gained insights into the future of WordPress, including ongoing projects like Data Liberation, community inclusion initiatives, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and more.

The atmosphere was filled with excitement when Matt revealed that this year’s State of the Word will take place in Tokyo, Japan, on December 16, 2024.

Additional questions from this session will be addressed in an upcoming post on the Make WordPress Project blog.

Stay connected

WordPress events enable technologists, open source enthusiasts, and community members around the globe to meet, share ideas, and collaborate to drive WordPress and the open web forward.

Don’t forget to mark your calendars for WordCamp Europe (Torino, Italy), WordCamp US (Portland, Oregon, United States), and next year’s WordCamp Asia in Manila, Philippines!

Thank you to @angelasjin, @dansoschin, @eidolonnight, @bmcsherry, and the WordCamp Asia organizers who made this event and post possible.

The foundational infrastructure for the websites you build and manage is crucial for ensuring a safe, secure, fast, and reliable environment. That’s where WP Cloud comes in. 

Automattic, the parent company of WordPress.com, built WP Cloud because we wanted a cloud platform constructed from the ground up just for WordPress. We’ve hosted millions of websites across the WordPress ecosystem and have become one of the most trusted providers in cloud services. 

At WordPress.com, the WP Cloud infrastructure powers all websites on our Creator and Entrepreneur plans. 

We’re proud of WP Cloud’s 99.999% uptime, automated burst scaling and failure detection, and failover redundancies that allow you to spend time focusing on building your business or serving your clients instead of worrying about whether a traffic spike will crash the site. 

WP Cloud is also incredibly secure. With DDoS protection, malware scanning, anti-spam measures, SSL certificates, TLS traffic encryption, and real-time backups, you’ll have peace of mind from day one. 

We’re confident that there’s no better cloud platform for your WordPress site(s) than WP Cloud. And we’re not the only ones to think so. 

Today, WP Cloud is announcing that Bluehost—one of the largest website hosts in the world—is launching a new product built atop WP Cloud’s best-in-class infrastructure. 

Bluehost Cloud includes all the technical excellence of WP Cloud, with bundled options for hosting multiple websites. Plus, as with all of the sites on WordPress.com, it comes with Jetpack’s highly acclaimed performance and security features built right in. 

To kick off this partnership, we’re showcasing Bluehost Cloud on WordPress.com’s pricing page, so that you can choose the product that best fits your business needs. As fellow supporters of the WordPress ecosystem, we’re glad Bluehost has chosen WP Cloud for this powerful new offering.

Take advantage of these robust WP Cloud solutions with the Creator, Entrepreneur, or Bluehost Cloud plan.

Jelly Pixel Studio, a web development agency based in Indonesia, specializes in crafting unique and illustrative websites for clients worldwide. The company serves a wide variety of clients, from small businesses to larger corporations, utilizing WordPress.com as their primary hosting platform due to its exceptional stability, fast performance, and robust features.

Over the years, the agency has migrated numerous websites to WordPress.com and has seen consistent uptime and improved efficiency, saving both time and money. The agency’s founder, Andika Purnawijaya, better known as Dika Fei, cites WordPress.com as the magic solution that helped solve many hosting challenges for the agency’s clients.

Let’s explore a bit more about Jelly Pixel and how WordPress.com helps keep their clients happy.

Dika’s path to web development

Dika Fei embarked on his web development journey right after university, learning and mastering IBM’s WebSphere. His first interaction with WordPress.com came when he joined Codeable to work with various clients whose sites were hosted on the WordPress.com platform. Dika saw the immense value in WordPress.com and adopted it for the majority of his projects.

Jelly Pixel Studio was born out of a failed startup venture by Dika and three of his friends from college. After their initial attempt at creating something similar to Shopify for the Indonesian market didn’t work out, the team decided to channel their expertise into a highly successful web development agency. When choosing a platform, they settled on WordPress due to its simplicity and intuitiveness.

The team later branched out to form a second agency, WP Stronk, which handles subscription-based web maintenance and content entry.

When asked if the agencies focused on any specific niche, Dika said, “YES! Jelly Pixel is exceptionally skilled at creating illustrative websites with subtle scrolling animations. Our websites leave a lasting impression even after you close the tab.”

The impact of WordPress.com

WordPress.com has been instrumental in helping Jelly Pixel Studio streamline its operations and deliver outstanding services to clients. With a mix of projects in maintenance and those being actively developed, Dika and his team of seven, or “the magnificent seven” as they like to call themselves, have benefited greatly from the platform’s robust features and top-notch performance.

WordPress developers and agencies are no strangers to the perils and pitfalls of hosting. But WordPress.com solves those problems for Jelly Pixel Studio clients:

What I love about WordPress.com is its exceptional stability and blazing-fast performance, regardless of your setup. Even with other managed hosting providers, you often need to be mindful of  various settings such as: cache parameters and PHP workers. However, with WordPress.com, everything just works seamlessly. It’s a true “set it and forget it” experience. 

As long as your site is hosted on WordPress.com, you can rest assured that it won’t go down and it won’t slow down, no matter the traffic. I have no idea how you accomplished it, but it’s absolutely AMAZING! 

Literally magic

The team considers WordPress.com to be a good fit for their clients. Why?

You have amazing support, and your infrastructure is LITERALLY MAGIC. We have monitored our clients’ uptime, and 100% is a number we often see. How is this even possible? “Amazing” would be an understatement. You have saved me from a ton of urgent calls at night.

Jelly Pixel Studio believes WordPress.com has one well-kept secret:

I firmly believe that WordPress.com is the best hosting option for WooCommerce, particularly those with high traffic. 

He thinks this is a missed opportunity for many freelancers and agencies who may not have considered using WordPress.com for their hosting clients. He shares this example:

I have a client on a different host. They get HUGE traffic. Every time they have a sale, they need to purchase a package upgrade and I have to constantly monitor their ad parameters to ensure proper caching. With the way WordPress.com works, all of this would be seamlessly handled out of the box.

He adds:

Unfortunately, the knowledge of WordPress.com as a highly stable WooCommerce hosting solution seems to have been lost over time. It almost feels like a well-kept secret! 

The verdict

Dika and his team at Jelly Pixel Studio view WordPress.com as a valuable partner in their web development journey. Dika credits the platform for providing peace of mind, leading to a happier and more productive work environment for his team, as well as clients who no longer complain about their site’s performance. He looks forward to further cooperation with WordPress.com and hopes for the continued evolution of the platform’s capabilities.

At the heart of his work, Dika stands by this quote from Victor Frankl:

“For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself.”

This approach is echoed in the success story of Jelly Pixel Studio and WP Stronk, marking the agencies as businesses of kindness, dedication, and commitment to problem-solving.

The power of hosting with WordPress.com

WordPress web design and development agencies are discovering the power of WordPress.com hosting and the benefits it offers their clients. With full-stack performance, robust security, and developer-friendly features, WordPress.com provides agencies with a platform they can confidently recommend to their clients.

If you’re interested in getting access to the tools and features on WordPress.com that can support your development process, click here to enable our “I am a developer” setting on your WordPress.com account.

Finally, if you’re in search of an agency specializing in illustrative websites and CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization), Jelly Pixel Studio can help you. For web and content maintenance, check out WP Stronk for their comprehensive services.

February saw significant progress towards the upcoming WordPress 6.5 release and final preparations for WordCamp Asia. The results of the annual WordPress survey were released, and discussions began on the next steps for the Data Liberation project. Read on for the latest happenings in the WordPress space.

Get ready for WordCamp Asia

The stage is ready for the first WordPress flagship event of the year in Taipei, Taiwan. WordCamp Asia 2024 will kick off on March 7, promising three days of learning, networking, and inspiration.

This year’s schedule features an extensive lineup of speakers, including guests Josepha Haden Chomphosy, Ben Thompson, Noel Tock, and JU-CHUN KO. To conclude the summit, attendees can engage with WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg in a Q&A session. Find out how to submit your questions.

Can’t make it to Taipei? Watch the event live stream on the WordPress YouTube channel.

https://wordpress.org/news/2023/10/episode-64-patterns-in-wordpress/

Countdown to WordPress 6.5

WordPress 6.5 is on track for its much-anticipated release on March 26. Following last month’s beta releases, the first release candidate (RC1) is now available for testing—marking another significant milestone in the development cycle.

This major release will add finesse and fine-tuning to how you control your site-building experience, with lots to explore specifically for developers. Get a detailed overview of highlighted features in the Beta 1 announcement.

Stay on top of the latest updates in WordPress development with February’s edition of What’s New for Developers?

New in the Gutenberg plugin

Two new versions of Gutenberg shipped in February:

• Gutenberg 17.7 introduced multiple performance improvements, refinements to the link control UI, and shadow support for more blocks, among other notable highlights.
• Gutenberg 17.8 focused on stability updates. New features included a grid layout variation for the Group block, bulk export of patterns, and the ability to browse and try alternative templates from the editor’s sidebar.

Team updates

• Results of the 2023 annual WordPress survey were announced last month.
• An update on the Data Liberation project informs the next steps of this initiative and how to contribute to current conversations.
• The Community team shared key findings from the 2023 WordPress meetup survey.
• Meet the new cohort of the Contributor Mentorship Program.
• The Photos team posted recommendations for improving alternative texts when submitting images to the Photo Directory.
• Following discussions on the evolution of the Outreach Program, a new outreach group has been created on GitHub. This group aims to provide expertise and feedback to those seeking additional testing or voices on a new feature or solution.
• Core team members introduced the WordPress Core Trac Sustainability Focus, a part of the Sustainability team’s effort to enhance the sustainability of the WordPress codebase.
• A new release of WP-CLI is now available.
• Learn WordPress is regularly updated with new tutorials, online workshops, and more learning resources. Check out what’s new.
• The latest edition of People of WordPress features Sunita Rai, a content marketer and volunteer translator from Nepal.

https://wordpress.org/news/2023/10/episode-64-patterns-in-wordpress/

Requests for feedback and testing

• Your help testing WordPress 6.5 is key to ensuring everything in this release is the best it can be. New to testing? Read this post for more details on getting set up.
• The Training team is discussing how to bring accessibility-first approaches into their content creation and processes. Feedback is open until March 9.
• Version 24.3 of the WordPress mobile app for iOS and Android is ready for testing.

WordPress events

• WordCamp Europe 2024 is looking for photographers.
• The WordPress Kerala Photo Festival wrapped up with great success. The event received over 1,500 images from 163 participants, contributing to the Photo Directory passing the 15,000 photo milestone. Winners were announced in this post.
• Don’t miss these other WordPress events happening soon:
  • Women WordPress Day, Costa Rica, on March 8
  • Switzerland Community Day on March 23
  • WordCamp Torrelodones, Spain, on March 23-24
• Find out more local events or apply to organize one on the Events page.

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The first release candidate (RC1) for WordPress 6.5 is ready for download and testing!

This version of the WordPress software is under development. Please do not install, run, or test this version of WordPress on production or mission-critical websites. Instead, it’s recommended that you evaluate RC1 on a test server and site.

Reaching this phase of the release cycle is an important milestone. While release candidates are considered ready for release, testing remains crucial to ensure that everything in WordPress 6.5 is the best it can be.

You can test WordPress 6.5 RC1 in four ways:

Plugin	Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin on a WordPress install. (Select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream).
Direct Download	Download the RC1 version (zip) and install it on a WordPress website.
Command Line	Use the following WP-CLI command: wp core update --version=6.5-RC1
WordPress Playground	Use the 6.5 RC1 WordPress Playground instance (available within 35 minutes after the release is ready) to test the software directly in your browser without the need for a separate site or setup.

The current target for the WordPress 6.5 release is March 26, 2024. Get an overview of the 6.5 release cycle, and check the Make WordPress Core blog for 6.5-related posts in the coming weeks for further details.

What’s in WordPress 6.5 RC1?

Thanks to the many contributors testing up to this point, this release include more than 20 bug fixes for the Editor and more than 40 tickets for WordPress Core.

Get a recap of WordPress 6.5’s highlighted features in the Beta 1 announcement. For more technical information related to issues addressed since Beta 3, you can browse the following links:

• GitHub commits for 6.5 since February 27
• Closed Trac tickets since February 27

Want to look deeper into the details and technical notes for this release? These recent posts cover some of the latest updates:

• Introducing Plugin Dependencies in WordPress 6.5
• Unification of the Site and Post Editors in 6.5
• Updates to the HTML API in 6.5
• Interactivity API in 6.5
• I18N Improvements in 6.5 (Performant Translations)
• WordPress 6.5 adds AVIF support
• Core Editor Improvement: Power in the Details
• Core Editor Improvement: Robust Revisions in the Site Editor
• All 6.5-related developer notes

How you can contribute

WordPress is open source software made possible by a passionate community of people collaborating on and contributing to its development. The resources below outline various ways you can help the world’s most popular open source web platform, regardless of your technical expertise.

Get involved in testing

Testing for issues is critical to ensuring WordPress is performant and stable. It’s also a meaningful way for anyone to contribute. This detailed guide will walk you through testing features in WordPress 6.5. For those new to testing, follow this general testing guide for more details on getting set up.

If you encounter an issue, please report it to the Alpha/Beta area of the support forums or directly to WordPress Trac if you are comfortable writing a reproducible bug report. You can also check your issue against a list of known bugs.

Curious about testing releases in general? Follow along with the testing initiatives in Make Core and join the #core-test channel on Making WordPress Slack.

Search for vulnerabilities

From now until the final release candidate of WordPress 6.5 (scheduled for March 19), the monetary reward for reporting new, unreleased security vulnerabilities is doubled. Please follow responsible disclosure practices as detailed in the project’s security practices and policies outlined on the HackerOne page and in the security white paper.

Update your theme or plugin

For plugin and theme authors, your products play an integral role in extending the functionality and value of WordPress for all users. 

Thanks for continuing to test your themes and plugins with the WordPress 6.5 beta releases. With RC1, you’ll want to conclude your testing and update the “Tested up to” version in your plugin’s readme file to 6.5.

If you find compatibility issues, please post detailed information to the support forum.

Help translate WordPress

Do you speak a language other than English? ¿Español? Français? Русский? 日本? हिन्दी? বাংলা? You can help translate WordPress into more than 100 languages. This release milestone (RC1) also marks the hard string freeze point of the 6.5 release cycle.

Release the haiku

What’s this? RC1?
Three weeks left until it’s done.
Come and test. It’s fun!

Thank you to the following contributors for collaborating on this post: @dansoschin, @courane01, @hellosatya, @huzaifaalmesbah