WordPress has been around for a long time; we all know that WordPress is merely the best open-source content management system available in today’s time. Backed with features such as simplicity, flexibility, easy publishing, user management, media management, W3C compliance, plugins, SEO, and whatnot, WordPress is highly valued.
As per the recent stats, WordPress controls 35% of the internet, and over 400 million people visit WordPress sites each month. Looking at the growing demand for this CMS, it is believed that the number will continue to rise unprecedentedly.
WordPress always stays in demand due to its regular updates and enhancements. Like always, WordPress is back again with a new update, the highly anticipated release of the newer version of WordPress is finally here. WordPress.org released WordPress 5.4 “Adderley” to the public on March 31, 2020, which mainly focuses on more ways to make your pages come alive, and boosts in speed you can feel.
What WordPress 5.4 Has in Store?
New Blocks
The new feature of WordPress 5.4 includes two brand new blocks with better blocks overall than previous ones. The main highlights are:
- There are two new blocks (social icons and buttons) that will make adding interactive features fast and easy.
- There are new ways with color – gradients in the buttons and cover block, toolbar access to color options in rich text blocks, and for the first time, color options in the group and columns blocks.
- The process for placing and replacing multimedia in every block now works the same in almost every block.
- Images in the Media + Text block can now link to something else.
Clearer Navigation and Faster Editor
Now speaking of navigations and editors, they now have cleaner UI, more clear navigation, and easier tabbing. Let’s explore the main highlights related to the clearer navigation and faster editor:
- They now have more decent block navigation with breadcrumbs.
- If you are using the keyword, they promise you to offer a better tabbing and focus with an option to tab over to the sidebar of most blocks.
- WordPress.org alleges that you can expect a 14% faster loading of the editor and 51% speedier time-to-type.
- Tips have now been replaced with a welcome guide window, which you can use when you need it.
- It’s now easier to distinguish when you’re in a block’s edit or navigation mode.
Privacy Enhancements
In terms of privacy improvements, WordPress 5.4 assists with numerous privacy issues globally. Now, when users and stakeholders ask about regulatory compliance or let’s say how your team handles user data, the answers should be a lot easier to get right.
Have a look at what are the privacy improvements the newer version of WordPress has to offer:
- Personal data exports now include user-session information and user location data from the community events widget along with a table of contents.
- You can see the progress as you process to export and erasure requests through the privacy tools.
- WordPress 5.4 is assuring to offer a cleaner look for privacy tools overall.
Developer Additions
There are some additions made mainly for developers’ betterment. The newer version of WordPress has the following perks to offer to the developers:
Natively Add Custom Fields to Menu Items
- Two new actions let you add custom fields to menu items, without a plugin and without writing custom walkers.
- On the menus admin screen, wp_nav_menu_item_custom_fields fires just before the move buttons of a nav menu item in the menu editor.
- In the customizer, wp_nav_menu_item_custom_fields_customize_template fires at the end of the menu-items form-fields template.
Simpler Block Styling
- Negative margins and default padding are gone now. You can style blocks the way you want and need them. Besides, a refactor got rid of four redundant wrapper divs.
- If you build plugins, now you can register collections of your blocks by namespace across categories.
- Let users do more with two new APIs: block variations and gradients.
- In embeds, the block editor now supports TikTok. Meanwhile, CollegeHumor is gone.
To Conclude
To reap the benefits of WordPress offerings, it’s always best to keep your WordPress site updated. The latest version of WordPress has a lot more to offer. Looking at the updates of the newest version, it is highly recommended to get rid of the older version and start using this newer and more advanced version of WordPress i.e., WordPress 5.4.
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