Martin TolovskiJust before the end of last year, the Elegant Themes founder Nick Roach announced to the world what changes will arrive with Divi 5.0, and how the version will do a complete rewrite of the core technology that the theme is based upon.
The Divi updates you need to know in 2023 and beyond center on website performance, scalability, security, and extendibility. As such, it’s no surprise that Divi’s features will keep up with the ever-evolving needs of its users.
As WordPress and web technologies continue to evolve, the Elegant Themes team has made sure to adapt and meet these changes.
From new Builder features to design options and improved performance, the Divi theme of the present and the future is set to help you stay ahead of the curve.
Table of Contents
- Divi 5.0 as The Driving Force
- Greater Gutenberg Compatibility
- Finally Abolishing Shortcodes
- Brand New Builder API
- Upgrading to The Latest PHP
- Prepared for WordPress 6.2
- Divi Cloud and Divi Teams
- Fascinating Things Ahead
Divi 5.0 as The Driving Force
Divi 5.0 revamps the entire core technology of Divi, redefining for the future and building on top of the extensive knowledge and experience that the Elegant Themes team has acquired over the last decade.
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Geared towards performance, stability, extend-ability, and scalability, Divi 5.0 is in line with where WordPress is going, with an API that gives developers incredible freedom.
When you update, at first glance, everything regarding the Theme and the Divi Builder is going to look and function the same way that it does now, but everything that’s in the back-end is going to be improved significantly.
March 7 Update: Divi 5 Dev Alpha Release
On March 7, the Elegant Themes team has released Divi 5 Dev Alpha as the first stepping stone towards the public release of Divi 5.
As the public beta phase is approaching, you may even use the Divi version 5 on new websites if you find that the improvements outweigh whatever features may be missing in the current build.
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April 20 Update: Strengthening The Foundation
Both in March and April this year, the Elegant Themes team has improved the backward compatibility with Divi 4 modules. They have also fixed random bugs found by participants in the beta program related to features and functionality already existing in Divi 5.
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The most significant update was the work involving Divi’s element style components, which significantly streamlines the process of assigning design settings to individual module parts, making creating Divi modules faster for our team and the team community.
The team also filled in many user-facing features, including the Global Elements, Divi Help Modal, Save to Library functionality, Section Divider settings, and more.
June 1st Update: Previewing The Speed Of Divi 5
Throughout May, the Divi team worked on section dividers, background videos, condition options, responsive content and fixed a few bugs.
Most of the work was focused on solidifying the Divi 5 API, which is what the Dev Beta versions are about.
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The team also worked on unifying and simplifying Divi 5’s new REST API. Several new functions and their implementations are added, which aim to significantly reduce the time it takes to create a Divi module.
Greater Gutenberg Compatibility
Following WordPress’s footsteps is an important part of Divi’s success, and the Elegant Themes team highlights that with the latest updates.
As commented by Elegant Themes developer Josh Ronk:
The Elegant Themes team works towards the best possible Gutenberg compatibility, with the intent of enabling developers to use Gutenberg blocks inside Divi built pages.
Finally Abolishing Shortcodes
One of the biggest changes that Divi 5.0 will bring is the modern storage format, aka the migration away from shortcodes. This provides several benefits for Divi users, including:
- Faster and streamlined Divi pages and design settings processing.
- Fewer bugs and shortcode complexities in the post content.
- Creating an easier path for enabling nested content.
Most importantly, this update aligns Divi with how WordPress will continue to evolve in the future, setting up the Theme and the Builder for success in advance as a result.
Brand New Builder API
Thanks to the brand new Builder API, the Divi Builder will become fully customizable.
Not only will developers be able to create new and amazing modules, but they will also be able to create new types of settings and completely new features of their own.
Nick Roach’s analogy explains this perfectly:
In essence, you will have everything you need to customize your Divi build, and rebuild from the ground up. As we said earlier, total customization of Divi!
The Elegant Themes team will take every “third party developer” in the community and elevate them to a “1st party developer”, allowing them to customize the builder with the exact same tools that the theme and Builder developers use.
This is in line with the future of Divi as a broader ecosystem, just like WordPress. In fact, developers that have delved into creating WordPress blocks will probably be pleased with the Divi 5.0 module API.
Upgrading to The Latest PHP
Of these four components, PHP is perhaps the most influential WordPress server stack component that affects the performance of your website.
PHP plays a critical role in how your Divi website performs, and this is why you must use the latest and stable version in 2023 and beyond.
Each update fixes bugs that could lead to website vulnerabilities otherwise. Moreover, each new PHP version improves the number of requests that it can process per second, which results in a faster website overall.
For more information on Divi and PHP, make sure to visit Jason Champagne’s “Divi Hosting Requirements” article on the Elegant Themes Blog.
Speaking of hosting, you won’t get far in 2023 and beyond without a proper hosting solution for your Divi website. Kinsta’s hosting plans are designed to provide you with the speed, security, and flexibility you need to take your Divi website to the next level.
Prepared for WordPress 6.2
WordPress 6.2 “Dolphy” was finally released on March 28. There are many features and fixes that will be of use for Divi websites, and let’s not forget how important updating to the latest version is:
- Security: New updates often include security patches that address vulnerabilities and protect your website from hackers.
- Bug fixes: Updates can fix bugs and errors that may be affecting your website’s performance.
- New features: WordPress updates often include new features and functionality that can improve your website’s design, functionality, and performance.
- Compatibility: Updating WordPress ensures that your website is compatible with the latest versions of plugins and themes, which can prevent conflicts and errors.
- Performance: New updates can improve the performance of your website and make it load faster.
Updating WordPress is crucial to ensure that your Divi website is safe, stable, and functioning optimally.
Divi Cloud and Divi Teams
Last year, Elegant Themes launched a couple of new projects for the community: Divi Cloud and Divi Teams, features and applications that work with Divi and improve Divi as a result.
When you save something to Divi Cloud, it becomes available on all of your and your clients’ websites while you build them.
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With Divi Teams, you can invite team members and clients to your team and give them access to Divi and its suite of services.
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You control what your team members can and cannot do, allowing web design teams to properly delegate tasks and collaborate effectively across the Divi ecosystem and give their clients access to our support system.
Fascinating Things Ahead
We continue to be amazed with the new updates that Elegant Themes has delivered to Divi over the years, and 2023 won’t be an exception.
We are going to keep track of things and focus on integrating these updates in our own products, and once any major update is released, we will make sure to test it and inform you about it.
Stay in the loop and start benefiting from the new Divi features, performance, UI, and safety improvements.
Ready for Divi 5.0? Get in touch with our partner agency Everklick today to prepare your Divi website for 2023 and beyond!