For the longest time, WordPress was the go-to platform for anyone looking to build a website.
From its easy-to-use interface to the extensive collection of plugins and themes, as well as the thriving community, WordPress had a lot for people to like. This was especially the case for people entering the world of web development and design. WordPress made it easy to create and manage websites.
However, the web has evolved. While WordPress still holds a dominant position in terms of market share, it’s not the same unstoppable powerhouse that it once was. Indeed, WordPress is repositioning itself, trying to stay relevant.
In this article, we’ll discuss five trends that will continue to accelerate in 2025 and see how these are both challenges and opportunities for professionals building client websites with WordPress.
- The end of WordPress as an entry-level tool
- The decline of page builders
- WordPress Core focuses on its strengths
- Consolidation of the plugin ecosystem
- A bursting WordPress Bubble
- On to 2025!
The end of WordPress as an entry-level tool
Most of us, including me, ended up using WordPress because it was so much simpler than other content management systems.
But even with all the plugins and themes, and Core striving for an easier user experience, running WordPress requires far more technical knowledge than hosted solutions.
Josh Hall interviewed Mark Szymanski on his podcast in an episode called Is WordPress for Old People? And he puts this well into words in the episode description:
Let’s get real and share exactly how it is…WordPress is not the tool of choice for most web designers getting into the game today.
It may be where most end up, because WordPress is the most popular, customizable, and only open-source platform online but as a starting point, it’s not where most new web designers are starting.
Drag and drop platforms like Framer, SquareSpace, and ShowIt and even more robust platforms like WixStudio, WebFlow, and Duda seem to be where young whipper-snapper web designers jump to first.
Mark Szymanski
Overall, this is a good trend for freelancers and agencies. WordPress is now a mid-to-high-tier option. With that comes the opportunity to reach a different clientele and charge higher rates.
But with that also comes the challenge of building the technical skills required to deliver at this level.
The decline of page builders
Page builders like Elementor are still going strong, at least according to the data from sites like Built With.
While we see the curve flattening out in 2023 and 2024, there is still growth—and a lot of existing installs! That and the rise of plugins like Bricks Builder lead certain people to decry any mention of page builders being on the decline as “block fanatic propaganda.”
But we clarify a few points:
- WordPress sites change very slowly. While the install numbers of an antiquated tool like Site Origin drop, they do so slowly. Many sites run on Elementor, and that is unlikely to change until the website gets redesigned. Or, as is often the case nowadays, moved off of WordPress.
- There is a lot of marketing momentum. One of the smartest moves that Elementor made was to create a very attractive affiliate program. And countless affiliate-monetized videos and blog posts still recommend page builders as the tool for building WordPress sites. This momentum is very hard to slow down, especially as there isn’t any monetary incentive to promote WordPress Core, which is free.
- New page builders are created, but they are niche tools: There’s a lot of talk about Bricks on social media but not many installs. The plugin has a dedicated niche audience, and that’s a viable business for the plugin maker. But none of these tools will ever be remotely as popular as the page builders of old.
- If beginners do not choose WordPress, they also do not choose a page builder. Page builders have never made an impact on higher-priced projects,With beginners choosing hosted platforms, the audience for this tool will naturally shrink.
This is not to make abstraction of the increasing technical challenges that tools such as page builders face. Using a third-party page builder is already quite a disjointed experience. And with more and more plugins choosing to go blocks-first or only, the number of integrations with page builders will drop.
So,, while I often hear otherwise, I cannot see how page builders can maintain their popularity with all these factors working against them.
Read Why plugins that don’t support the block editor will go extinct to know more about the longer term impact of blocks on the plugin ecosystem.
WordPress Core focuses on its strengths
In July 2024, Beau Lebens, head of engineering at WooCommerce, published WooCommerce in 2024 and beyond: Roadmap update. It outlines what’s coming to WooCommerce in the near future. While the post is an interesting read, it’s not as poignant as the motto behind some of these changes: “More in Core”.
For those not familiar with WooCommerce, the plugin compares poorly to its direct competitor, Shopify. Indeed, features that are available as part of a free Shopify account are paid extensions in WooCommerce, which, of course, makes WooCommerce a lot less attractive.
So, WooCommerce is merging some of its paid extensions into the core software and developing free alternatives to third-party paid plugins as part of the free Core offering.
Now, you might say: What do I care about WooCommerce? Well, this quote from Beau Lebens on his Do the Woo podcast appearance is interesting:
And then, I think one of the other big challenges for us is making sure that interoperability is there so that once you start putting together a solution, it still feels like a meaningful, singular commerce experience.
And that exists both at that WooCommerce layer and that WordPress layer. And that’s where it gets really interesting, frankly, and challenging. And where I think the direction that WordPress is going (which we can talk about if that’s interesting) is really sort of enabling a level of integration and flexibility that actually is not great at the moment in WordPress.
WordPress has some, I think, almost a lack of opinion that has been great for flexibility but has resulted in some experiences that feel a bit disjointed and that aren’t as deeply integrated as they could be.
Beau Lebens
I consider this a good take on where WordPress is going, especially with the third phase of Gutenberg, which is focussed on content editing workflows.
WordPress doesn’t have a very clear competitor, such as WooCommerce. But we know that the many competitors of WordPress win because they offer a better interface and a more consistent experience.
When you look at the current iterations of admin designs shared on WordPress.org, it’s clear that the project is doubling down on WordPress’ strengths as a content management system for text and media content. While plugins can and will be able to extend these interfaces, it won’t be the free-for-all that we were used to in the past.
If you want to know more about the direction that modern WordPress is heading in, check out The Big Gutenberg Misconception.
Overall, I consider that this direction will be beneficial for people who use WordPress to develop custom websites. But it requires freelancers and agencies to use WordPress as what it is—a best-in-class content management system—and not an empty shell that can be transformed into a community hub, real estate listing website, marketplace, or whatever other usages that are out there.
Over the years, I dealt with too many sites put together from random plugins. These sites were slow, difficult to maintain (often breaking randomly), and to top things off had awful admin experiences.
That’s not the kind of sites that are going to make WordPress successful with the people designing and building custom sites, and not with the actual users of the sites. So I’m looking forward to a more opinionated but solid and streamlined WordPress admin experience.
Consolidation of the plugin ecosystem
In the past, there was a clear playbook for having success with selling plugins:
- Create a free version and put it on WordPress.org.
- Upsell a percentage of free users to the paid version.
And since WordPress was growing constantly, that meant a growing number of potential customers eager to buy.
But those days are long over.
The freemium model always had its own challenges when it came to discoverability and the cost of supporting a huge number of free version customers.
While some successful plugin makers went premium only (like Gravity Forms) or built up their own marketing channels, others struggled with this approach.
To make things worse, the “plugins are too cheap!” advocates were proven wrong by the market. There’s a limit to how much you can ask for a plugin.
Due to the rising complexity of software development, the cost of marketing, and the support burden, we’ve seen numerous plugin creators exit the market.
Instead of having lots of small plugin shops selling a few small or even just one big plugin, we’re now seeing companies that build up a portfolio of plugins through acquisitions.
The reasons for this are multiple:
- Ability to cross-sell to the audiences of all plugins.
- Ensuring interoperability between all plugins in the portfolio.
- Benefits of having shared branding and marketing effort.
- Cost-effective development and support through shared resources.
We’re going to see this trend continue. WordPress is not an exception, as the Apple App Store has gone through a similar transition. Initially, there were many independent developers who could make a decent living through one or maybe a few apps. But the trend has shifted to major companies that earn the most revenue through apps.
A bursting WordPress Bubble
The term “WordPress Bubble” designates the community and ecosystem around the WordPress software. The idea is that you are caught in a figurative bubble with people who share similar ideas, experiences, and values as you.
But there have been cracks in the community for years. Gutenberg is often identified as the main reason behind the discontent among WordPress users, but that’s nothing more than shooting the messenger.
The reality is that the web has changed, as has web development. The economic dynamics worldwide have changed, and that has a direct impact on any organization in the Internet space.
However, a key event was that Automattic and WP Engine were going at each other at the end of 2024.
And the event itself is not what’s so important. It’s the change in mindset that this has caused on the broader community. People suddenly became aware of what author MJ De Marco, in his book Unscripted calls the “commandment of control”:
Play in an organization that you control or you will be at the mercy of someone else.
MJ De Marco
This commandment has kept me from using plugins like page builders in the past. But I have always been aware that my livelihood is dependent on WordPress, which I don’t have any control over.
And this year has made this more apparent to a lot more businesses. And they are reacting to this by reducing the dependency on WordPress:
- Agencies and freelancers are diversifying their offerings by including services that are not directly connected to WordPress. SEO, email marketing, copywriting, and design are all examples of offerings that aren’t dependent on WordPress.
- Product companies are building tools as separate software-as-a-service platforms, which then connect to WordPress and other solutions. OptinMonster was an early adopter of this model. Starting in 2013 as a plugin, it became a SaaS in 2015.
- Plugin vendors are building extensions for other platforms. Yoast launched its Shopify offering in 2022. WooCommerce companies like Barn2 are entering the Shopify market as well.
On to 2025!
The WordPress landscape is shifting as the software positions itself as an up-market solution. This shifts WordPress into a more specialized role as a proven, user-friendly, and highly customizable content management system.
Rather than being the one platform to power everything web-related for businesses, it will exist alongside other specialized, best-in-class tools.
This offers more opportunities for freelancers and agencies to deliver specialized services at higher rates. However, it also requires new skills and a more sophisticated approach to development.
Building with WordPress still offers immense potential, but only for those willing to invest in mastering it fully, which demands greater expertise and adaptability than ever before.
