mastodon 4.8.0-nightly.2026-10-06We’re an independent news biz dedicated to reporting on what’s happening in the WordPress ecosystem. Get our stories in your inbox: therepository.email/newsletter
Out now: The Repository #312 🗞️
🛡️ WordPress 7.0.2 patches critical pre-auth RCE found with OpenAI's Sol Ultra
🧪 WordPress 7.1 Beta 3 now available, punts Unicode email support
📊 Matt Mullenweg responds to active install growth data ticket for first time in 4 years
Four years after WordPress .org pulled the active install growth data for plugins, Matt Mullenweg has responded with a new reason for not bringing them back.
New name, same mission. The WP Open Community Collective says it has rebranded to better reflect its intent to support open source contributors beyond WordPress.
A private Slack channel, 24 hours' notice, and strict information-sharing rules. How the WordPress project coordinated industry-wide defenses before going public with two vulnerabilities.
WordPress 7.1 Beta 4 gives sites a way to turn off responsive style editing, and drops the inherited styles display after contributors couldn't agree on a design approach.
WP Engine's second vertical platform launch this year targets mid-market merchants doing millions in revenue who've outgrown their existing commerce stack.
Unicode email address support was merged into core six weeks ago after 11 years of development. It's been pulled from 7.1 and will move to a community plugin.
Mullenweg spent several hours posting in WordPress Slack about a release culture producing "boring or mediocre crap," called for an end to attacks on Automattic, and said the project had spent years damaging itself.
WordPress 7.0 won't ship during Contributor Day at WordCamp Asia next week after Matt Mullenweg called for a delay to get real-time collaboration's database architecture right.
Woo has confirmed four bugs in WooCommerce Subscriptions silently disabled automatic payments for some stores, with one developer saying affected store owners have potentially lost tens of thousands in revenue.
The WP Community Collective Publishes Open Source Contributor Pay Standard
Out now: The Repository #296 🗞️
🚧 WP 7.0 RC1 delayed to March 24
🌱 Roots launches WP Packages alternative to WPackagist
🧑⚖️ Plugins Team seeks reviewers as submissions top 500/week
🚀 Featured plugins experiment drives 26k installs
Read it here: https://therepository.email/296
The WordPress Accessibility Team has overhauled its theme accessibility-ready guidelines for the first time since 2012. Theme authors have until June 30 to comply.
Out now: The Repository #297 🗞️
🚧 WordPress 7.0 RC1 ships despite core committer concerns
📉 Market share dips below 43% as AI reshapes site building
🔌 WordPress.com adds "write" access for AI agents
🧠 Elementor launches Angie
Read it here: https://therepository.email/297
WordPress 7.0 RC1 Ships Despite Core Committer Concerns Over Release Readiness
WordPress Is Colliding With AI — and Nobody Had ‘None’ on Their Bingo Card
Nick Hamze’s Featured Plugins Experiment Delivers 26,000 Installs in First Two Weeks
Roots Launches WP Composer as Open Source Alternative to WPackagist
https://www.therepository.email/roots-launches-wp-composer-as-open-source-alternative-to-wpackagist
The workshops started as a one-off in Portland last year. Now they're a four-day track, and attendees will leave with a site, a domain, and a free year of hosting.
A supply chain backdoor planted in a plugin with 20,000 active installs was caught by Wordfence and quickly shut down within Protect the Shire's hold window.
WordPress Security Team’s 6.9.2 Retrospective Details Checklist Gap Behind 6.9.4 and Backporting Tensions
The WCUS 2026 schedule is now live, with AI dominating the program as organizers look to attract attendees with a beginner track and a small business marketplace in Phoenix next month.
A US college wants to join Credits but needs its students writing code. It's prompted the program to build its first pathway shaped around a field of study.
Playground has supported persistent sites since March, but users keep telling the team they don't know that. A new dock-based UI aims to fix the discoverability problem.
SWORD took the overall prize at CloudFest Hackathon 2026, with Universal Access Browser Extension placing second and Frugal AI third. This year’s event saw 101 attendees from 20 countries hack 10 projects.
https://www.therepository.email/sword-wins-cloudfest-hackathon-2026
Gutenberg 22.7 Ships New Guidelines Feature for Site-Wide Standards
https://www.therepository.email/gutenberg-22-7-ships-new-guidelines-feature-for-site-wide-standards
Out now: The Repository #313 🗞️
🛡️ Wordfence AI catches plugin backdoor in first Protect the Shire win
⚖️ WP Engine accuses Automattic of destroying evidence
🧟♂️ Class action survives second motion to dismiss
🛒 WP Engine & BigCommerce launch ecommerce platform
Read it here: https://www.therepository.email/313
After their proposed class action was dismissed in December, two agency owners have survived a second motion to dismiss thanks to the WordPress Engine Tracker website.
The first analysis of student feedback since WordPress Credits started shows strong satisfaction scores, with the focus now moving to quality and retention.
WordPress AI Connectors Lack Plugin-Level Controls — and the AI Team Is Already Working on It
Matt Mullenweg has given a handpicked group of people sandbox access and authority to overhaul WordPress.org.
WordPress 7.0 RC1 Delayed to March 24 Over Real-Time Collaboration, Client-Side Media, and Package Size Concerns
AI can spin up a WordPress site in minutes. Keeping it fast, secure, and profitable? Well, that's a different story.
In this #sponsoredpost, Matthew Telfer from 20i looks at how AI is reshaping the WordPress economy, and why architecture is where the real value is moving.
Elementor Launches Angie, a Free AI Plugin for Building Custom WordPress Functionality
WordPress.com Gives AI Agents Access to Create, Edit and Manage Content via MCP
AI isn't killing WordPress work. It's redistributing it.
Implementation is getting cheaper while systems thinking is getting more valuable.
Matthew Telfer from 20i maps out what that shift means for designers, developers, and agencies in this #sponsoredpost.
WP Engine claims sworn declarations and deposition testimony contradict months of assurances that Matt Mullenweg's WhatsApp, Signal, and Telegram messages had been preserved.
76% of web designers say AI is their biggest concern right now. But inside the WordPress ecosystem, the picture isn't so simple.
Matthew Telfer from 20i breaks down where AI is actually hitting hardest, and where value is shifting next.
The full exploit chain abuses six internal WordPress mechanisms to go from anonymous visitor to admin in two HTTP requests.