WordPress 6.9: A Major Step Toward Collaboration

WordPress 6.9, nicknamed “Gene”, launched on December 2, 2025 and brings significant upgrades across collaboration tools, developer APIs, performance, and the block-based editing experience.

What’s New in WordPress 6.9

Block-Level Collaboration with Notes

One of the standout new features is Notes — a block-level commenting system inside the editor. Teams can leave feedback directly tied to specific blocks, reply in threads, and manage review cycles without external tools.

This brings a Google-Docs-style collaboration layer into the WordPress editor, ideal for multi-author workflows.

Dashboard-Wide Command Palette

The Command Palette (opened with Ctrl/Cmd + K) now works across the entire WordPress dashboard — not just the Site Editor. This lets users quickly navigate admin areas, run commands, or jump to content without clicking through menus.

Design and Typography Enhancements

Fit Text to Container: Heading and Paragraph blocks can now automatically scale text to perfectly fill a container for stronger typography control

New Blocks: WordPress 6.9 introduces several useful blocks:

• Accordion block (collapsible content sections)
• Time-to-Read block (estimates reading time)
• Math block (rendering math/LaTeX)

Abilities API – Foundation for AI & Automation

Perhaps the most forward-looking addition is the Abilities API — a standardized, machine-readable way to register what WordPress, themes, and plugins can do.

This API forms the baseline for future AI workflows and automation systems, enabling external tools or AI agents to interact with WordPress capabilities in a consistent way.