The future of WordPress 2027: Data liberation and the new admin

WordPress 7.0 “Armstrong” shipped on 20 May 2026 and WordPress 7.1 “Mary Lou” on 19 August 2026. The official roadmap projects 7.2 for 10 December 2026 and calls those dates “for rough planning purposes only”. So a forecast for 2027 now has a year of real releases to stand on: what shipped, what was pulled at the last minute, and what has no date at all.

This article keeps those three apart. Every prediction below is our opinion as a WordPress development team, and each one points to the announcement or Core post it grows from. Where the project has published nothing, we say so instead of filling the gap.

#What WordPress 7.0 and 7.1 shipped in 2026

Two major releases landed this year. The table lists the parts that matter for the 2027 picture, taken from the 7.0 release announcement and the WordPress 7.1 Field Guide.

The 7.1 Field Guide counts more than 310 Core Trac tickets in the release, over 100 of them enhancements and more than 180 bug fixes. The font management page in 7.0 works with block, hybrid and classic themes, which matters for the theme section further down.

#What did not ship: real-time collaboration and React 19

The roadmap describes Gutenberg Phase 3 as “centered on collaborative editing and workflows” and promises “real-time collaboration and smoother publishing processes”. It is the headline feature of the phase, and it has missed two releases in a row.

• 7.0: the release announcement lists no real-time collaboration.
• 7.1: the Roadmap to 7.1 still had open questions about scope (a full feature or only the underlying architecture) and about the storage mechanism. A collaborative editing outreach effort recruited testers through the Gutenberg plugin. The Field Guide then says the feature “received extensive testing and feedback during the WordPress 7.1 cycle, but it is not enabled in the final release”.
• React 19: the upgrade from React 18 was also deferred beyond 7.1 and continues as an experiment in the Gutenberg plugin.

The 7.1 release leads were open about the trade-off. The Field Guide quotes Anne McCarthy: “sometimes what we don’t add is more valuable than what we do”.

Our prediction: real-time co-editing reaches core during 2027, after at least one more cycle in the Gutenberg plugin. Until then, post locking stays the rule, so two people cannot edit the same post at the same time. Teams that need simultaneous editing today can test it in the plugin on a staging site, never on production.

#Will the new WordPress admin replace wp-admin

The left-hand sidebar of wp-admin has been with us since WordPress 2.7 (2008). The State of the Word 2023 recap said the admin redesign “will take cues from the Site Editor, eventually allowing users to shape their WordPress Admin experience based on their unique needs”. That is the stated direction, and it carries no date.

What has actually shipped is gradual. 7.0 brought a refreshed dashboard and the Command Palette. The Roadmap to 7.1 lists a Design and Identity screen for site identity settings, a Site Editor that follows the admin colour scheme, admin bar polish, and work to move DataViews onto new Design System primitives.

#Merging the dashboard and the Site Editor

We expect the distinction between “The Dashboard” and “The Site Editor” to keep fading, screen by screen, as DataViews replace the old list tables. This is a forecast, not an announced feature:

• Contextual editing: you would not go to “Settings” to change the site title. The planned Identity screen is a first step: it gathers identity settings in one place.
• JavaScript-first: we expect more admin screens to behave like a Single Page Application, with instant transitions and no full reload on save. The Site Editor already gained routing and a wordpress/boot package in 7.0 for plugins that build custom Site Editor pages.
• Customisability: agencies could curate the admin experience natively, locking down specific blocks and branding the interface without hacking functions.php. For teams handing sites over to non-technical editors, that is the part that matters day to day.

Our bet for 2027 is that the classic sidebar menu still exists at the end of the year, with fewer screens behind it rendered the old way.

#React and REST API skills for WordPress developers

Developers who built a career on PHP hooks for admin customisation will need a wider toolkit. React and the WordPress REST API move from “nice to have” to baseline. The PHP side keeps its value too: 7.0 added PHP-only registration for blocks and patterns, so server-side developers can ship blocks without a JavaScript build step.

Learn more about professional WordPress development at WPPoland.

#What the WordPress Data Liberation project means

At State of the Word 2023 in Madrid on 11 December 2023, Matt Mullenweg introduced Data Liberation as an additional focus for 2024, “with the goal to make importing from other platforms into WordPress as frictionless as possible”. The recap adds that the initiative “will work on one-click migration and the export format from WordPress”.

The Data Liberation page now describes five phases:

Data Liberation’s Phase 4 (site sync) is a different thing from Gutenberg’s Phase 4 (multilingual). The two roadmaps number their phases independently.

For Phase 3 the page names Studio by WordPress.com and its open source data liberation agent plugin, with specialised tools for GoDaddy Websites & Marketing, Hostinger Website Builder, HubSpot, Shopify, Squarespace, Webflow, Weebly and Wix.

#Avoiding vendor lock-in with WordPress

Historically, SaaS platforms make it awkward to take your content elsewhere. Data Liberation works the other way:

• Export format: Phase 2 is the structured import and export work. Our prediction is that by the end of 2027 a full-site move (content, media and design) between WordPress hosts becomes a routine step, instead of fragmented WXR files that drop images and metadata.
• Import from anywhere: Data Liberation is not only about leaving. The Phase 3 tooling targets moving to WordPress from closed builders.
• Why: by making it easy to leave, WordPress gives people a reason to trust it enough to stay.

#Data Liberation and WordPress in the enterprise

For large organisations, a documented exit path removes one of the standard objections to WordPress: vendor lock-in risk. A CTO or enterprise architect can sign off on WordPress knowing a clean exit path exists. Our opinion is that this helps enterprise adoption more than it hurts it.

#Will block themes replace classic WordPress themes

What will a theme be in 2027? For new builds, almost certainly a block theme. For existing sites, the project is not forcing the change: the 7.0 font management page supports classic themes, and the Field Guide records that a proposal to hide the Classic block from the inserter in 7.1 was reverted, so the Classic block remains available.

#theme.json, global styles and block patterns

• Global Styles: the visual identity of a site is defined in theme.json. Colours, typography, spacing and shadows live in one declarative configuration file. 7.1 added responsive styles per viewport, both in Global Styles and on individual blocks, so a common reason for custom CSS goes away.
• Pattern libraries: a “theme” increasingly becomes a curated collection of block patterns. 7.0 also lets you detach a pattern from its original for isolated editing.
• Fewer child themes: child themes stop being necessary for style overrides. You use the Global Styles interface and export your changes as a variation, which also removes a common source of breakage: conflicts between parent and child themes.

Our prediction: classic PHP themes keep working through 2027, and new agency work starts as block themes by default.

#How agencies earn without selling premium themes

Agencies that sold packaged premium themes need a different business model. We expect the value to move to:

1. Design systems: consistent, scalable pattern libraries built for a specific brand.
2. Brand translation: turning a brand identity into a custom theme.json configuration.
3. Migration and optimisation: moving clients from legacy PHP themes to modern block architecture.

#AI features already in WordPress core

AI is no longer plugin-only territory. The roadmap lists a 2026 goal to “intentionally embed AI across the WordPress experience to simplify creation, workflows, and contribution”, with “project-wide guidelines that uphold transparency, user control, and WordPress values”.

What exists in core today:

• Abilities API: introduced in WordPress 6.9. The 7.1 Field Guide says 7.1 makes abilities “easier to discover, expose, validate, and integrate with external clients”, adding filtering to wp_get_abilities(), execution lifecycle hooks and a unified public exposure flag.
• AI Client: 7.0 added an AI Client that lets WordPress communicate with generative AI models. Connections to external providers are managed on the Connectors screen, which ships with three presets and lets you add your own.
• Client-Side Abilities: a JavaScript counterpart to the Abilities API, with a built-in UI and Command Palette integration.

The writing features people associate with “AI in WordPress” live in an optional AI plugin, not in core. According to the 7.0 announcement it adds image generation and editing, title and excerpt creation, and alt text suggestions. Alt text suggestions help web accessibility only if an editor reviews them, so treat them as drafts.

#What the AI roadmap points to for 2027

The Roadmap to 7.1 listed generation streaming and embeddings for the AI Client, with embeddings described as a way to represent content “as vectors to enable meaning-based search across a site”. It also listed Guidelines (editorial rules that tie into AI tooling, with import and export between sites) and Connector authentication beyond API keys.

Our prediction: meaning-based site search built on embeddings becomes the first AI feature that ordinary visitors notice in 2027. Model providers stay external, so the hosting bill and the data-processing agreement become part of every AI project scope.

#AI-assisted translation in the block editor

If Gutenberg Phase 4 (Multilingual) ever meets the AI Client, assisted translation inside the editor is the obvious use case: an editor writes in one language and gets draft versions in others that need human review. Nothing in the 2026 releases ships this, so it stays a forecast.

#Native multilingual in WordPress core without WPML

For years, we have needed WPML or Polylang. The roadmap lists Multilingual as Gutenberg Phase 4, described only as “Core implementation for Multilingual sites”. The developer handbook page on multilingual WordPress still states: “WordPress currently does not support a bilingual or multilingual blog out-of-the-box.”

Neither 7.0 nor 7.1 contains multilingual core work. The closest item in the Roadmap to 7.1 is broader Unicode support for email addresses.

#Translations in the core database schema

Our expectation is that Phase 4 starts only after Phase 3 collaboration lands, which puts native multilingual beyond 2027. When it does arrive:

• Standardised database schema: core would support translations officially, with no more plugin tables such as WPML’s wp_icl_translations bolted on the side.
• Performance: native query support would remove the extra queries and joins that translation plugins add today.
• Impact: a large segment of the plugin market would shrink. For businesses serving Canada, the EU or other bilingual markets, a single core-supported setup would be a real simplification.

#Multilingual content strategy on a single WordPress site

Until then, the practical choice is still a plugin or a Multisite network per language. One WordPress site can serve several languages with clean URLs and hreflang today, but through a plugin. If search visibility across markets matters to you, see our GEO and LLMO optimisation service.

#How WordPress agencies and plugins change by 2027

#What WordPress agencies will offer in 2027

“Install WordPress and pick a theme” stops being a service anyone pays for. We expect successful agencies to focus on:

• Solution architecture: choosing the right mix of core, plugins and external services for each business case.
• AI integration: registering abilities, configuring Connectors and writing Guidelines for a client’s specific editorial workflow.
• Global content strategy: running multilingual sites on today’s plugins while planning for core multilingual later.
• Performance at scale: keeping enterprise sites within good Core Web Vitals under heavy load.

#Which WordPress plugins lose relevance

Plugins that duplicate what moved into core lose relevance first: icon sets (SVG Icon API in 7.1), font managers (7.0 font management page), responsive-visibility add-ons and basic AI connectors. The ones likely to thrive offer genuinely specialised functionality: CRM integrations, custom business logic and niche tools core will never cover. Multilingual plugins stay necessary for the whole of 2027.

#How to prepare your WordPress site for 2027

None of this requires waiting for a release. These steps pay off whichever way the roadmap lands:

1. Move to block themes for new work: if you still run a classic PHP theme, plan the transition to a block theme (FSE). The longer you wait, the more custom code you carry over.
2. Test the iframed editor: 7.1 made the post editor iframe-based for every site, including those that register legacy meta boxes. Check custom editor styles and meta box plugins on staging.
3. Adopt theme.json and responsive styles: define your site’s styles in theme.json instead of custom CSS.
4. Register abilities for your custom features: if a plugin you maintain exposes actions, the Abilities API is how AI clients and the Command Palette will reach them.
5. Plan for multilingual: structure content with translation in mind, so a later move from WPML or Polylang to a core solution is easier.
6. Try real-time collaboration in the Gutenberg plugin on staging: you will know before release whether it fits your editorial workflow.

#Where to track the WordPress roadmap

Three sources answer most questions before they turn into rumours. The Make WordPress Core blog publishes a “Roadmap to” post at the start of each cycle and a Field Guide at release candidate, and the Field Guide is the authoritative list of what shipped and what was pulled. The roadmap page gives the phase overview and projected dates. Talks from WordCamp Europe and WordCamp US are published on WordPress.tv, and they are a free way to follow where core contributors are taking these projects.

#Conclusion

In 2027, we expect WordPress to be less of a “blogging tool” and more of an operating system for the web: the base layer of data ownership, user management, abilities and block rendering on which everything else is built.

For developers, the practical consequence is to build block-first: custom blocks registered through block.json or PHP-only registration, block themes with theme.json, actions exposed as abilities, and content stored in structures that Data Liberation importers and exporters can read. Code built around the classic editor and shortcodes is the part most likely to need rework, even though core keeps supporting it.

The future is open. Are you ready? Learn more about professional WordPress development at WPPoland.