Unprofessional

Hi @garak,

The message saying that Wordfence is “not yet officially supported on PHP 8” will be removed soon. We’ve been testing with PHP 8 even when it was still in beta, and have continued to test after the initial compatibility fixes in October and early December.

The main purpose of this message was to recommend to users that they don’t update too soon, because many plugins, themes, and WordPress itself were not fully compatible.

Wordfence itself is compatible with PHP 8, but with tens of thousands of other plugins and themes using some of the same WordPress hooks that we use, it’s still possible for plugins or themes to cause conflicts with Wordfence that only occur on PHP 8 — especially plugins and themes that have not had any recent releases, or if they have a relatively small install base.

At the time PHP 8 was released, WordPress 5.6 described their PHP 8 support as “beta compatible”: https://make.www.ads-software.com/core/2020/11/23/wordpress-and-php-8-0/ WordPress 5.7 did not mention PHP 8 in their release announcement, and they have still had some recent fixes for PHP 8 compatibility, including two coming up in WP core in the 5.8 beta, to be released in July.

I agree that 7 months is a long time. But for previous significant PHP releases, like 7.0 or even 7.4, we did not find it necessary to add such a message at all, because there were fewer breaking changes that in the language itself.

You are welcome to run Wordfence on PHP 8 — just keep in mind that there are risks of compatibility with other plugins or themes.

-Matt R
Wordfence QA Lead

I Think you overreacted… this is one of the must-support plugins.
and much better than mod secure… (even in server level Wordfence win mod_secure when it comes to WordPress site)

PHP-8 is a big improvement but is not important as Wordfence, and most of the plugins do not support him, don’t blame Wordfence…
(btw i am a regular person, if you do not believe me you can get inside my profile you will see I have business from my own)

@garak,

Why would you give a one-star review to a plugin on a topic that is not performance related? The message your mentioned is helpful since it simply warns users what to expect if they switch to PHP 8.

If you’re still using Wordfence and it’s keeping your website safe, don’t you think they deserve better? And remember, this plugin is FREE.

Many would be grateful if you would consider updating your one-star review. We give them FIVE STARS!

BTW, the reply provided by @wfmattr is spot on.

Cheers!