The theme of the State of the Word 2022 keynote was focused The four freedoms of open source. WordPress spokesperson and co-founder Matt Mullenweg focused on the CMS’ growth over its nearly two decades of existence in an ever-changing tech landscape.
As CMS continues to change with the times, we reached out to some of the community’s top influencers to get their thoughts on the trends we might see in 2023. From improvements to Gutenberg, plugins that incorporate AI tools, and more, 2023 is shaping up to be a great year for WordPress to move forward.
WordPress trends for 2023 predicted by influencers
Market growth and artificial intelligence plugins
WordPress has become a powerhouse in the open source CMS market, and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon. Look for WordPress to take a big leap in 2023 as WordPress trends help increase its market share.
That being said, closed source products will continue to grow and hold WordPress’ overall market share – think of WordPress as the Pac-Man of CMS systems!
We can too Expect an influx of AI-powered pluginswhich will help website owners create new sites quickly and easily or work on existing ones.
The WordPress block editor is expected to expand; However, there is still the problem of new users figuring out how to set it up. Fear not, though, as WordPress hosts continue to offer quick-start options so you don’t have to do all the heavy lifting on your own.
-Mike Demo, Head of Partnerships Codeable.io | Twitter: @mpmike
An emerging trend that I believe will continue and strengthen in 2023 is the formation and growth of partnerships between leading product and enterprise agencies in the WordPress ecosystem. [… ] I hope we are beginning to see leadership and industry self-regulation.
The WordPress business ecosystem can set standards for performance, security, and the experience WordPress users should have (or never have) regardless of their hosting platform. They can proudly outline and share best practices for plugin and theme development. They can raise expectations for professional WordPress product and service providers. We may see several new industry events and associations spring up to support these goals.
I hope we will also see increased collaboration between the WordPress and PHP communities through the PHP Foundation. Finally, I hope and expect to see new impetus for community-funded mainstream development through the WP Community Collective. All of these trends revolve around a single theme of progress through collaboration and creative initiatives within the WordPress business community.
-Dan Knauss, Technical Content Generalist StellarWP.com | Twitter: @dan_knauss
Changes in e-commerce tools
2023 will bring the adoption of performance-enhancing WordPress plugins that optimize UX and elevate the sales pipeline of e-commerce stores as customers find what they are looking for faster and easy checkout continues to be fundamental to growth. income.
Growing Global E-Commerce Sales:
Although the economy may fall into recession, cross-border trade helps protect businesses from the worst of the effects. Many businesses are already mitigating the risk of an economic downturn, with two-thirds of global online retailers still participating in large global markets 10% of their monthly online spend. Towards cross-border trade.
As a result, more online retailers are looking for targeted ways to improve CX for their growing international customer base. Implementing tools that support multiple languages and multiple currencies will be key to unlocking this.
Streamlining the customer journey:
More than two-thirds of companies compete primarily on the basis of CX, highlighting the growing need for e-commerce sites. Delivering a more convenient and intuitive customer journey.
I expect this to translate into more merchants opting for WordPress plugins that enhance user-centric features like advanced search filters, permalink management, and “buy now” buttons. As a result of this uptake, many e-commerce stores will refine their overall site structure to improve customer journey and therefore revenue performance in 2023.
– Ian Poulson, project manager Premerce.com
The effect of Gutenberg and full site editing on CMS market share
In 2023, WordPress will continue to iterate and build Gutenberg and Full Site Editing (FSE) features.
We believe this continued push towards FSE and Gutenberg will result in a slight decline in market share due to the impact on new WordPress users. Webflow and similar tools will continue to eat away at WordPress’ market share.
However, once WordPress FSE becomes more stable and more convenient, the market share will increase. WordPress will continue to be one of the best options when it comes to websites, blogs, and e-commerce because of its flexibility, community, and amazing open source developers who continue to build and improve the platform.
We think the future of WordPress is bright in 2023 and beyond.
– Nat Miletich, agency owner ClioWebsites.com | Twitter: @natmiletic
WordPress’s Open Source Roots will continue to differentiate it from the competition
WordPress will continue to dominate market share.
In early 2023, it was reported that 43% of all websites on the Internet are powered by WordPress. While we’d all like to see that number exceed 50%, that likely won’t happen for several more years.
There are other great paid ownership platforms that continue to grow (some built on top of WordPress), but since WordPress is open and free, it has a good advantage to stay on top.
– Tony Florida, Founder TonyTeaches.tech
2022 State of the Speech Keynote: The Four Freedoms of Open Source
Josepha Hayden Chomphos In his introduction, he emphasized the importance of open source to the WordPress community.
“These four freedoms [of Open Source] will allow the removal of barriers to opportunities in the world. And by continuing to remove these barriers, we’re safeguarding a free, open and interconnected web for the future.”
The four freedoms of open source are:
- Run the program – Freedom to run the program for any purpose.
- learning and changing – The freedom to explore how the program works and modify it to make your calculations the way you want them to be.
- redistribution – Freedom to redistribute copies to help your neighbor.
- Distribute your copies – The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions, allowing the public to benefit from those modifications.
Josepha then answered the question she posed at the beginning of the segment: Why WordPress?
“The best answer […] is that we provide opportunities and freedoms long ago to people who may not even know that those freedoms are still important to them.”
This brought the relevance of the keynote into focus as Matt MullenVfor example took the stage to update the community on current and future projects.
20 years of WordPress
WordPress was founded in 2003 grew exponentially in the last twenty years. Because of this, there are many plans to celebrate CMS in 2023.
“We have a lot of exciting things coming up for WordPress’ 20th birthday. If you want to follow the following address wp20.wordpress.netWe’re going to have a site that will have special edition swag and merchandise.”
The book MilestonesTo celebrate the history of WordPress, it will receive an update on the last ten years.
On social media, users can share their thoughts and posts with the community Hashtag #WP20 the whole year.
Gutenberg updates
An important part of WordPress is Gutenberg, which is included at the end Phase 2.
Mullenweg said he is excited about the future of the block editor and its widespread adoption.
“I actually believe it [Gutenberg] will be bigger than WordPress itself in terms of contribution and adoption in web and mobile apps.”
Some Gutenberg updates include the ability to create full, responsive themes in the block editor or with help Create a Block Theme plugin.
For more information on the future of Gutenberg, I recommend reading the article in the January 2023 issue Create WordPress Core.
WordPress and Openverse
Openverse is a free WordPress stock library with 22 million images and 1.1 million audio files.
WordPress acquired this library in 2021 As a means of access for all Creative Commons licensed media.
In the future, Matt hopes to fully embed this project into WordPress, but for now users can access it from the WordPress.org site.
Getting to know the playground
Mullenweg received applause at the introduction playground.
use WebAssemblyPlayground allows users to create and configure a WordPress website directly in the browser without the need for a database or host connection.
While Matt emphasized how this new tool is still in its early stages, he is optimistic about its future.
“This can be used for web development, try the plugin before you install it […] Imagine a staging site built into WordPress instead of having to spin up a whole new web server and virtual machine to test things out, you can just click a button [and clone] Your existing WordPress will download it to your browser and then you can make any changes you want. When you’re done, put it on your live website.”
For more information on the state of speech in 2022 and to view the question-and-answer session, we recommend watching the entire conference YouTubeor WordPress.tv.
final thoughts
Only in 2022 did WordPress 1399 contributors. With the re-introduction of live meetings, incl WordPress Community Summit After a 6-year hiatus, the community is expected to grow again.
Members of this community with a passion for WordPress and open source include our influencers above.
WordPress is a major part of Internet history, and our influencer trends paint a bright future for CMS in 2023. Learn more about WordPress, Gutenberg, themes, plugins and more in our WordPress Education channel.
