WooCommerce 5.0: What’s New

WooCommerce 5.0 drops on February 9, but you don’t have to wait until then to test it out. 

The release candidate for 5.0 is now available. You can either download it directly from WordPress.org or install our WooCommerce Beta Tester Plugin.

For complete instructions how to test out this release, check out the Release Testing Instructions for WooCommerce 5.0.

If you are brand new to WooCommerce, we cover everything you need to know to get your online store up and running in Learning the WooCommerce WordPress Plugin.

WooCommerce 5.0 will be a minor release.  Like WordPress releases, a minor release means that this version will be focusing on bug fixes and performance improvements. This release also aims to be backward compatible with previous versions of the plugin. 

Starting with the release of 5.0, WooCommerce will be using the WordPress version of scheming moving forward. Before this release, WooCommerce used Semantic Version (Smever), which usually led to it being a backwards-compatibility breaking release.

• WooCommerce 5.0 Highlights
• Actions and Filters
• Database and Template Changes
• Beta Updates

WooCommerce 5.0 Highlights

• Product Review Count: This update should fix the review count when new reviews are added.
• Deprecate legacy reports: WooCommerce 5.0 soft deprecates legacy reports in hopes of pushing more users over to WooCommerce Analytics. 
• Added CSS variables: This release adds prefixed CSS variables to the stylesheet, giving developers more extendability when they need to use the same WooCommerce default styling without forcing them to recreate the CSS. 
• Improved product, coupon, and order restoring: If you trashed an order, coupon, or product prior to WooCommerce 5.0, then restored it, it would restore it into “draft” status. This version changes that functionality so that those items restore to the status they were when they were originally trashed. 
• Changing product type with attached files: An issue has been fixed for orders placed that contained products that had downloadable files. Changing the product used to result in a loss of file access and denied permissions, but this fix now recognizes those changes and will recreate permissions for the same customer as needed. 

Actions and Filters

WooCommerce 5.0 brings with it one new action and two new filters. 

The action “woocommerce_activated_plugin” signals that packages such as WooCommerce Admin have been activated.

The filter “woocommerce_delete_variations_on_product_type_change” was added to prevent

variations from being deleted while switching from a variable product type to a variable product type.

The filter “woocommerce_new_order_email_allows_resend” was also added. It allows resending of the new order email to the admin.

Database and Template Changes

WooCommerce 5.0 will not feature any schema changes to the database tables, but there will be a migration script that runs in the database that fixes any potential issues with the product review counts. This, in turn, will bump the database version to the 5.0.0 release.

There are no new templates or changes to templates included in this release. 

Beta Updates

WooCommerce 5.0 beta 1 released on January 19, and a second, unplanned beta came out just three days later with a few fixes and additions.

Beta 2 updates included:

• WooCommerce Admin version 1.9.0.
• Help tooltips will now appear when a task has not been completed for a second time to further assist the merchant.
• Home screen tasks now allow 3pd to add their own tasks
• “Unread” indicator was added to inbox messages to make it easier to see messages that haven’t been read yet.

There were no changes or updates made between beta 2 and the release candidate. 

For more WooCommerce and WordPress related news, check out our WordPress Releases Tutorials & Helpful Support Articles page.