The new WordPress 6.0 release is planned for May 24th, 2022. It will be the second major release of 2022 and will come with many new features and improvements
The improvements and changes:
1. Full Site Editing
You will be able to customize your WordPress themes using the same block editor that you use to create posts and pages.
You can make site-wide changes to your theme templates and edit them visually with blocks. Just remember that you’ll need a block enabled theme that supports this feature.
2. New Blocks in Block Theme Editor
Comments: You can now add a comments query loop block. It includes sub-blocks like comment author name, avatar, comment content, edit link, and more.
Read More: You will be able to choose different text, background, and border for the link to make it more prominent.
No results in Query Loop Block: You will be able to add the No Results block inside the block.
Post-Author biography: A new post author biography block can now be used along with Post Author and Avatar blocks.
Avatar: You can now choose if you want to display Avatar for a specific user or display the current post/page author’s avatar.
3. Miscellaneous Block Editor Enhancements
Border for Columns Block: You will be able to add a border around the columns block.
Spacing for Gallery Images: You will be able to adjust the spacing between individual images inside a gallery block.
Quick Shortcut to Add Internal Links: You will be able to quickly ad links by adding two square brackets followed by the post or page title.
Select Multiple Blocks in List View: You will be able to use SHIFT+Click or Shift+Up+Down keys to select multiple adjacent blocks in the list view and then move them up or down or perform other actions.
4. Switch Theme Styles
WordPress 6.0 will allow users to easily switch theme styles with one click.
This allows theme developers to add multiple styles presets to their themes that users can easily switch.
5. Export Your WordPress Block Theme
WordPress 6.0 will allow you to easily export your theme with all the changes you made.
You can then simply install this theme on any other WordPress website and it will include all the changes you made to the original theme.
6. Featured Image in Cover Block
You will be able to choose a featured image for a cover block and it will automatically display the current post/page’s featured image.
7. Easier Text Selection in Multiple Blocks
It will be far easier to simply select only the text you want to select.
8. Responsive Group and Row Blocks
You can choose how you would want blocks to behave on different screen sizes. You can also select multiple blocks and then choose between a row or a stack layout.
9. Improvements:
Following are some of the more notable accessibility improvements.
The Post title will be used as ALT text for featured images if no other ALT text is provided.
Better tabbing in blocks with placeholder elements.
Search announcement in block search.
Read description for blocks with a placeholder setup.
Admin bar text labels will be readable by screenreaders on smaller screens.
10. Backend Changes:
Following are some of these under the hood changes:
Webfonts API will provide theme authors with a more efficient way to manage local fonts via PHP or theme.json. (See details)
An API to prevent blocks from appearing on the Widgets screen. (#55301)
Make get_the_author_link pluggable. (#51859)
Improved sticky post query. (#36907)
We thank WPBeginners for their insights and warnings.
If you need assistance with your website updates, let us look into it for you.
