WordPress 6.3 ships on August 8th! For a sneak peek of what’s to come, members of the 6.3 release squad, Anne McCarthy and Rich Tabor, held a live demo moderated by Nathan Wrigley. 

More than 100 attendees watched as some of the most anticipated product features were demonstrated, from the brand-new Command Palette to new design tools and more.

Here are some of the key takeaways from the 6.3 live product demonstration.

Command Palette’s big debut

One of the most anticipated features of 6.3 is the Command Palette. It lets you quickly navigate and open different WordPress functions within the post and Site Editor. Access it using a shortcut command (Command + K or Control + K).

Page creation gets easier in the Site Editor

Now you can browse and edit pages within the Site Editor, providing a more cohesive WordPress experience. A new drafting flow debuts, allowing you to create and publish pages directly within the editor. 

Synced Patterns set to replace Reusable Blocks

You can create and manage all your patterns directly in the Site Editor. Once edited, all synced patterns (previously called Reusable Blocks) will change across a site—a huge time saver when making changes. 

Stay on top of design changes with Style Revisions

This enhancement offers a visual timeline of your site so you can see all the revisions in your site’s history and restore a previous style with just a click. 

New design tools and blocks

Controls for specifying aspect ratios to ensure design integrity, especially when using images in Patterns debut in 6.3, along with new blocks for Footnotes and Details. Easily add footnotes to your content and have them automatically linked to the corresponding text. With the Details block, hide or display content to create spoilers or accordions. 

Performance

WordPress is getting faster with 6.3 as content with images will see speedier load times. Both theme types (Classic and Block) will also benefit from performance improvements. The upcoming hallway hangout is an excellent opportunity to learn more about performance enhancements directly from the WordPress Performance team.

More from Core

• Revert to previously installed versions when manual updates for themes and plugins fail. 
• Dropping support for PHP 5. The new minimum supported version of PHP will be 7.0.0. The recommended version of PHP remains at 7.4 or greater.
• Accessibility updates, especially for List View and the broader Site Editor experience.
• Improvements to internationalization just-in-time translation loading.

These new features and more await you as Phase 2 of the WordPress Roadmap comes to a close with the 6.3 release.

A question and answer session followed the demo, with attendees asking plenty of great questions. The panelists shared links for additional reading regarding many new features—all conveniently added to the end of this post. 

A big thank you to everyone who helps make WordPress. Contributors power every WordPress release. Without the hundreds of contributors worldwide who help build WordPress, this live product demo wouldn’t have been possible. Thank you for all of your hard work.

References from the Live Demo

• Introducing the WordPress Command Palette API
• Core Editor Improvement: Advancing the Power of Patterns
• Comparing Patterns, Template Parts, and Reusable Blocks
• Image performance enhancements in WordPress 6.3
• The 6.3 Field Guide
• New in 6.3: Rollback for failed manual plugin and theme updates
• Dropping support for PHP 5
• WordPress 6.3 Accessibility Improvements
• Internationalization Improvements in 6.3
• #30496 Site Editor: MVP Customizer Compatibility/Integration
• #52128 Customization Ongoing Roadmap
• Building sidebars with the Site Editor
• New in 6.3: Rollback for failed manual plugin and theme updates
• Layout updates in the editor for WordPress 6.3

Props to @richtabor and @annezazu for reviewing this post and to @cbringmann, @meher, and @dansoschin for their logistics support to run the event.