plugins - WordPress 5 upgrade: until when is it safe to keep project running in 4.x?

As announced, Wordpress version 5 will be hitting the road this December. Considering the availability of security support and patches for previous versions (4.9.x, 4.8.x, 4.7.x), until when is it considered safe to postpone the 5.x upgrade and keep projects running in 4.x?

As announced, Wordpress version 5 will be hitting the road this December. Considering the availability of security support and patches for previous versions (4.9.x, 4.8.x, 4.7.x), until when is it considered safe to postpone the 5.x upgrade and keep projects running in 4.x?

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Share Improve this question edited Dec 6, 2018 at 11:04 Marcos Buarque asked Dec 5, 2018 at 11:36 Marcos BuarqueMarcos Buarque 15722 silver badges1010 bronze badges 3

• 3 Why do you need to postpone it? If you don't want the new editor just install the Classic Editor plugin. – Jacob Peattie Commented Dec 5, 2018 at 11:50
• I have read version 5 could be more disruptive than usual updates and maybe not backwards compatible in some aspects, but I should maybe dig deeper into that. – Marcos Buarque Commented Dec 6, 2018 at 11:06
• Only in regards to the editor, which is addressed by the Classic Editor plugin. – Jacob Peattie Commented Dec 6, 2018 at 11:14

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1 Answer 1

Sorted by: Reset to default 3

As stated here:

The only current officially supported version is WordPress 4.9.8. Previous major releases before this may or may not get security updates as serious exploits are discovered.

And it has always been that way - only one version is officially supported.

This means it's always a bad idea to postpone updates.

So if you're afraid of Gutenberg, then you should:

1. Prepare a test version for your site and check if it will cause any problems with 5.0.

2. Disable Gutenberg, if you don't want to use it.

You can disable Gutenberg with this code:

if (version_compare($GLOBALS['wp_version'], '5.0-beta', '>')) {
    // WP > 5 beta
    add_filter('use_block_editor_for_post_type', '__return_false', 100);
} else {
    // WP < 5 beta
    add_filter('gutenberg_can_edit_post_type', '__return_false');
}

or using one of available plugins.