WordPress 7.1 just hit its first beta. That means the feature list is locked and the release is now in testing, with a confirmed final release date of August 19, 2026.

What Beta 1 means for you

Nothing changes on your site today. Beta releases are for testers, developers, and anyone curious to try new features early on a throwaway site. WordPress.org is explicit about this: don’t install, run, or test the beta on a production or mission-critical website. Use a local install, a staging site, or a WordPress Playground instance, which runs entirely in your browser with no setup.

If you want to help test anyway, the WordPress Beta Tester plugin is the easiest route: install it on a test site, then switch to the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream.

What’s actually new in 7.1

Several of 7.1’s headline changes are already stories we’ve covered as they went through testing: the reversal that keeps the Classic block in the inserter, per-device block styling with no custom CSS, the cleaner back button and persistent toolbar, and the new Core Abilities API for AI agents. If you’ve been following along, those are locked in for this release.

Beta 1 also confirms a few things we haven’t detailed yet:

  • Notes get richer. The commenting-style Notes feature (WordPress’s answer to Google Docs-style comments) now supports @mentions and rich text formatting, so feedback between site editors reads more like a real conversation instead of plain text.
  • A better command palette. The keyboard-driven search tool you open in wp-admin (usually with Ctrl/Cmd+K) picks up quality-of-life improvements for finding settings and content faster.
  • More resilient media uploads. WordPress says uploads should better handle format support and recover more gracefully when something goes wrong mid-upload.

What you need to do

Nothing right now. When 7.1 ships as final on August 19, it will install automatically on sites with auto-updates turned on for minor and major releases. If you manage updates manually, plan to update after that date once you’ve confirmed your plugins and theme are compatible.

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