WordPress 5.5 updates released yesterday, 11th August 2020, is in the honour of Billy Eckstine. This updates acknowledges the 4Ss, that is Simple, Speed, Security & Search. Loading speed and cyber security are the major factors that concerns most of us when we think of launching a WordPress site. But this WordPress update 5.5 could be a game changer. Yes, a well optimised WordPress website does not require expensive server resources or premium website hosting like Siteground.
WordPress 5.5 Features
PageSpeed Optimisation with Lazy Load
50-70% of a page size depends upon the media like images, videos or fonts. The WordPress update takes care of image using the lazy load. When the viewport paints in the browser, the lazy feature loads the image. This feature is already available in Jetpack Plugin, but WordPress claims to have it added by default in the self-hosted solution. Very caring of Automatic!
Inbuilt Sitemaps for SEO
WordPress finally adds in-built Sitemaps to help a website appear in Search engines, the moment you publish them. It’s funny to believe that after a decade, finally WordPress has a default XML Sitemap that helps the search engine crawlers to discover posts and pages on the website.
Automatic Updates for WordPress Themes & Plugins
WordPress 5.5 feature adds a new column in plugin list, as Automatic Updates. So, with a press of a button to enable auto-updates, schedules a cron job after 2 hours. If you’re already using this feature from WordPress.com Manage Sites, then the same setting should apply in the dashboard.
New Block Editor with Patterns
A new block directory is available on the left top corner. New block editor patterns are comprises of useful and trending layouts for your webpage. For instance, a pattern called “Large Header with a heading” adds a full width image along with a heading. Therefore, such patterns reduces block handling complexity and increases productivity. WordPress wants 100% focus on the content not blocks. 😉
A new block Image Compare Block, which is neat way to compare before | after images using a slider.
Quickly Add Block in Post Editor
Type forward slash “/” in an empty block, which further opens a list of available block to add. Just made it simpler!
Edit Inline Image Block
WordPress update adds inline image editing features. That means you can crop or edit the image without leaving the post editor interface in dashboard. Saves a lot of steps and increase productivity without compromising the quality.
Features for Developers
- Server-side registered blocks in the REST API
- Dashicons Library updated with 39 Block Icons and 29 other icons
- Passing data to template files
- PHPMailer library updated to 6.1.6
- And read more here
Is Upgrading to WordPress version 5.5 Safe?
WordPress 5.5 acknowledges to improve page speed score for performance, better user interface and visibility to rank on search engines. It is absolutely a stable release, so you can upgrade from WordPress 5.x to 5.5 fearlessly.
Do let us know, in case you find any bugs when upgrading to WordPress 5.5 by posting a comment below.
Thank you, Akshay. Will try to use the image cropping feature at least.
Sure. Blocks are the future of WordPress and adapting to them is a joy. WordPress has also added “@” to tag an Author or User while editing a post. All you have to do is type “@” and it shows the list of users for you. 😉