The Classic Editor plugin will be officially supported until December 31, 2021

This means that all plugin authors, theme authors, third parties, and the WordPress Core team will no longer feel obligated to support two editors.

So, from 2022 henceforth, not only will this plugin become incompatible, but everything else in WordPress too. The latter will happen sooner; so, it’s best to start using the new editor before that happens.

From my understanding, this plugin is only meant to ease the transition to Gutenberg.

Thanks for your input Sybre.

Still hoping that the plugin author can let me know if the Classic Editor plugin will be an option to keep using the classic editor (possibly combined with TinyMCE Advanced) in versions of WordPress from 2022 and up.

I personally do not have this plugin installed to ease into using Gutenberg, i have it installed because i want to keep using the classic editor indefinite.

The non-commercial website that i build over the years does not support easy transfer to switching it and the workflow to using another editor let alone Gutenberg…, i basically would be condemned to having to build it up from the ground again and that’s not a real option.

So if the Classic Editor plugin is a dead end then i would have the choice to continue without further updates or try my luck with a fork like ClassicPress, i think the choice then would be with the lather one and then hope for the best.

I know WordPress is a gift horse and beggars can’t be choosers but i’m disappointed that such a radical change is made and that the WordPress core team does not feel obliged to keep supporting the older setup. The Classic Editor plugin already has over 500000+ installs now, they are leaving a lot of people by the side of the road to cope with the fallout of that decision.

And then to read that the powers that be do and those in favor do not expect a need for longer support after 2021 and that 2021 is a date far in the future basically kills all my optimism and hope of the Classic Editor plugin being something that will allow me to continue using WordPress as usual years and years to come.

But better to hear things as they are then to be left in the dark so hope to hear if the Classic Editor plugin is something that can and will be maintained after 2021. I’m depending on it but its not in my hands, i depend on others to (be able to) keep it available.

I only use the “text” editor and not the visual editor. I handcode my html for a variety of reasons.

Does the Guttenberg editor come with a text only mode? If not why not.

@microcap, yes it does. So you can still do that in the new editor.

Hi,

Just wanted to clarify, as there’s some misunderstanding here ??

We are guaranteeing support until at the very least 2022, at which time we will re-evaluate the need. That means if we see that the supermajority of you having movedover to using the new editing experience, there’s no need to provide maintenance by core for this feature, but if there’s a need for it, we will keep supporting it our selves beyond that.

Of course, if it does come to a point where there’s too few users for us to dedicate many resources, we’ll not put of the possibility of someone else taking over the maintenance of the plugin, or we may have found an even better solution by then.

In short, the date we’ve provided is to give everyone an absolute minimum time frame to work with, so they know that they won’t have to be worried for the first coupld of years at least.

Thanks for the feedback Marius,

i also read the part of reevaluating by core team if there still is a need to further extend support for the classic editor after the current period of guaranteed extended support but stated in the same article is that it is not expected that that will be the case.

Fact is that the decision has been made by core team to cut the classic editor and to go Gutenberg and for me that is like an eviction notice. That i will not be able to continue with what i build in the not so far future. When i then found the Classic Editor plugin that gave me hope that there would remain a way to keep using the classic editor but i now wonder if it will be possible that it can be maintained after the official support stops.

I think that is the gap between the WordPress developers core who found in Gutenberg a promising way to go and develop WordPress into the future with new possibilities but its a horror for people like me who are maintaining and building on the structure that they build with classic editor WordPress. Gutenberg is not a problem if you are working on the code developing side or if you only have a couple “Hello World” posts but if you build a big(ger) site with some complexity and not a real option or energy to reorganize then future for what you build became very unsure.

So i still wonder if Classic Editor plugin can and will be supported after December 31 2021 making that i can continue with a up-to-date WordPress. I do not mind Gutenberg but i do mind if WordPress stops supporting the classic editor.

Make Gutenberg the editor for new users/installs but keep supporting classic editor in the background for a long time would be my plea.

I’m fairly confident that should core decide that maintaining this plugin is an added burden that isn’t feasible to keep up with, there are more than enough capable developers we would be happy to let maintain it beyond that, so I feel confident saying that it’ll keep working for quite some time beyond that ??

Thanks Marius for being positive that there will be a future for us who can not make the switch to Gutenberg. But sadly no hard guarantees which probably only WordPress itself could provide by committing to offering a real long term support for the classic editor and this plugin.

A approach of long term classic editor support combined with making Gutenberg the default editor for all new WordPress users/installs with only a advanced well tucked away option to enable using the old classic editor could make that there will be the switch to Gutenberg as aimed for by WordPress core but also that that switch does not dupe people depending on using the classic editor.

Not sure why long term support for people depending on the classic editor WordPress setup was not made a integral part in the transition plans migrating to a WordPress with Gutenberg. At least that is the impression that i get.