WordPress: 25 Interesting Facts You Might Not Know

I’ve been using WordPress since 2008. In fact, I’ve built three websites with it (including the one you’re currently visiting).

What is WordPress?

WordPress is a well-liked and frequently used open-source content management system (CMS). It’s used to create and manage content for websites. Without needing to have sophisticated technical knowledge, it offers a user-friendly interface along with a variety of tools and features that make it simple to develop and customize websites.

There’s probably a lot that you don’t know about this CMS, but today my aim is to change that.

Here are 25 Interesting Facts You Might Not Know about WordPress

1. WordPress was created as a result of the major creators of the blogging program b2/cafelog stopping its development. Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little, two b2/cafelog users, made the decision to create a brand-new platform on top of it.

2. On May 27, 2003, the open-source CMS was introduced and made accessible to the general audience.The community of bloggers and website builders liked version 1.1.

It was built with a lot of improvements over b2 Cafelog. A redesigned admin interface, fresh templates, and automatically generated XHTML 1.1 compatible templates were all included in the initial release of WordPress.

3. In December 2005, version 2.0 introduced a revamped admin dashboard, transforming the administration screens significantly. This updated admin area implemented JavaScript and DHTML to enhance the user interface, enabling users to perform simple tasks without the need to load a new page.

With these improvements, users gained the ability to effortlessly add categories and tags to their posts directly within the post editor.

This eliminated the need to navigate away from the editing interface. Additionally, users could delete comments seamlessly without reloading the comments screen, streamlining the commenting process.

These enhancements aimed to enhance the user experience by providing a more efficient and seamless workflow within the platform. It was also the first release that came with Akismet anti-spam plugin pre-installed.

4. On March 1, 2006, Automattic, the company established by Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of WordPress, initiated the process of trademark registration and the associated logo.

5. In 2008, Happy Cog, a web design company, joined the project to collaborate on designing a new admin interface.

A usability study was conducted to ensure a user-friendly experience. Throughout the year, the project introduced new features such as shortcodes, one-click updates, and built-in plugin installation, enhancing functionality and ease of use for users.

6. In July 2009, Syed Balkhi, an 18-year-old web developer, launched WPBeginner with the aim of empowering clients to manage their own WordPress websites.

This decision led to the rapid growth of WPBeginner as the largest unofficial resource site for beginners. Additionally, it served as the catalyst for the creation of Awesome Motive, a prominent WordPress product maker known for its plugins, which are now utilized by more than 25 million websites.

7. In June 2010, Automattic, the company established by co-founder Matt Mullenweg, transferred the ownership of the trademark and logo to the WordPress Foundation.

This pivotal event in the CMS’ history marked a crucial milestone as it guaranteed the long-term growth and sustainability of the CMS, independent of any particular company or group of developers.

It solidified the project’s commitment to remain a community-driven platform that can thrive and evolve with the collective efforts and contributions of its users and supporters.

8. On June 17, 2010, version 3.0 was launched, marking a significant advancement towards WordPress as a content management system. This major release introduced numerous notable features, including custom post types, improved custom taxonomies, customizable backgrounds and headers, menu management, contextual help on admin screens, and more.

Another significant development was the integration of the WordPress MU project into the plaform’s core, enabling the creation of Multisite networks. It also came with the Twenty Ten theme, which started the tradition of a new default theme for each year.

9. 2011 saw the introduction of two noteworthy features: post formats and the admin bar. Post formats allowed users to easily differentiate and style various types of content, such as quotes, images, videos, and more. The admin bar provided quick access to commonly used administrative functions, improving the user experience and simplifying navigation within the platform’s dashboard.

During this period, a range of impressive plugins emerged, empowering users to leverage the platform’s capabilities for eCommerce purposes. These plugins facilitated the development of robust eCommerce platforms on top of WordPress, enabling users to create online stores and build powerful eCommerce websites.

10. 2012 saw the introduction of the theme customizer, theme previews, and new media manager. These functions were of great assistance to new users while building image galleries and previewing themes before switching to another one.

12. The new automatic updates feature that version 3.7 introduced in 2013 allowed the CMS to automatically update the software on user’s sites for minor releases. The Google Chrome browser’s automatic updates feature is pretty similar to this.

13. By 2013 WordPress had already became the most popular CMS in the world. In case you were wondering, more than 43% of the websites on the Internet make use of this CMS today.

14. The MP6 interface was introduced with the release of version 3.8 in December 2013. On whatever device or screen size, this UI was responsive and designed to offer users a better user experience.

15. Version 3.9 was made available on April 16, 2014. It concentrated on enhancing the visual post editor. This allowed images to be dropped right into the post editor by dragging them there.

Users could browse their gallery previews and edit photographs directly inside the editor. This release also added audio playlists and live widget previews. More refinements were made to the platform’s core throughout the year with the subsequent 4.0 and 4.1 releases.

16. 2014 was the first year when non-English downloads for WordPress surpassed English downloads.

17. In 2015, the CMS witnessed the release of three significant versions: 4.2, 4.3, and 4.4. These releases introduced notable enhancements to the platform, with a particular emphasis on localization, emoji support, theme customization, and the establishment of a robust infrastructure for the REST API. In the same year, WooCommerce (the most popular WordPress eCommerce plugin was acquired by Automattic).

18. In 2016, WordPress witnessed the release of three major versions: 4.5, 4.6, and 4.7. Each release brought various new features and improvements to the platform.

These updates included streamlined updates for plugins and themes, the introduction of content recovery through browser storage, and the addition of custom CSS for theme customization. By the end of the year, WordPress.org announced its active support for HTTPS, emphasizing the importance of secure connections for WordPress websites.

19. 2017 saw the release of two major versions: 4.8 and 4.9. These updates introduced a range of new default widgets, enabling users to easily add audio, video, images, galleries, rich text, and HTML to their websites. These releases laid the foundation for the new WordPress block editor.

20. WordPress 5.0, which introduced a brand-new editing interface, was released in 2018. The project name for the new block editor for WordPress was Gutenberg. The block editor remained the focus of WordPress development as the community moved towards widespread adaptation.

21. 2019 saw the start of the Site Health project implementation into the CMS’s core. With WordPress 5.1 and 5.2, Site Health started showing users notifications when an older PHP version is detected. It also added protection for White Screen of Death by allowing users to log in securely in case of a critical error and then fix it from within the dashboard.

22. The outbreak of a global pandemic in 2020 presented unanticipated issues for the WordPress community. Global WordCamp events were postponed, and online gatherings were arranged by the community. A sizable portion of WordPress developers and community members were accustomed to working remotely and three significant WordPress releases (5.4, 5.5, and 5.6) were released as the development process went on.

23. With version 5.7 and 5.8, work on comprehensive site editing features began in 2021. To make creating site-wide templates in WordPress simple, a new templates feature and many site-wide blocks were added.

Work on the Full Site Editing experience started, automatic updates were implemented, block directories, block patterns, and lazy loading pictures were all introduced, among other enhancements.

24. WordPress’s primary goal for 2022 remained to enhance the overall site editing process. Version 5.9 brought in more site editing blocks, and many themes started to provide a better site editing interface based on the block editor.

25. WordPress 6.2, which brought out-of-beta full site editing, was published in 2023. To make it simple for anyone to build unique layouts using the site editor (no coding required), a new template browsing interface was developed. In addition, WordPress brought back the distraction-free writing mode for the block editor (also known as Gutenberg).

Well, there you have it, 25 interesting facts you might not have known about WordPress. If I’ve left out anything important, feel free to comment below.

Watch this space for updates in the Facts category on Running Wolf’s Rant.