WordPress 5.0 Beta 4 is Now Available for Testing!

WordPress 5.0 Beta 4 Release: Yesterday, WordPress 5.0 Beta 4, the beta version of the next big release WordPress 5.0, was made available by WordPress.org.

The software is still in the development mode, and that is why it is best that you don’t run it on a production site. Consider setting up a test site just to play with the newest version. To get the taste of the future, WordPress 5.0, try the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (you’ll want “bleeding edge nightlies”). Or you can download the beta here (zip).

The excitement is all time high with the major version expected to be released in late-November (official targeted date is November 27) this year. The WordPress development team has fixed some big issues since the Beta 3 release. You can know about them in detail below:

WordPress 5.0 Beta 4 has updated the block editor to match the Gutenberg 4.3 release. These are the changes and bug fixes you’re likely to find in the updated block editor:

  • An Annotations API, allowing plugins to add contextual data as you write.
  • More consistent keyboard navigation between blocks, as well as back-and-forth between different areas of the interface.
  • Improved accessibility, with additional labelling and speech announcements.
  • Better support for plugins that have more advanced meta box usage.
  • Script concatenation is now supported.
  • Ajax calls could occasionally cause PHP errors.

An API for translating your plugin and theme strings in JavaScript files has been added in Beta 4. The block editor now uses the added API and you can start using it too. Learn more about it here.

The new default theme, Twenty Nineteen has been updated and includes several changes, a few of which are:

  • Menus now properly support keyboard and touch interactions.
  • A footer menu has been added for secondary page links.
  • Improved backwards compatibility with older versions of WordPress.

You can follow the polishing of Twenty Nineteen theme here.

Not only the new, but also, all of the older default themes have also been polished to go along with the block editor.

So, these were the changes that WordPress 5.0 Beta 4 has introduced since its last Beta 3 release.

If you think you’ve found a bug, you can post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also find a list of known bugs.

We’re really excited about the major release this year and the name that will be chosen for it. What has got you excited about the WordPress 5.0? Let us know in the comments below.

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