WordPress 6.9 Planning Proposal and Call for Volunteers

Planning is underway for WordPress 6.9, and this post outlines a proposed schedule along with a call for volunteers to support the release process.

Following the typical cadence and accounting for holidays later in the year, the proposed final release date for 6.9 is Tuesday, December 2, 2025.  This proposed timeline remains flexible to adjustment by the resulting Release Squad as they determine what timeline works best for their schedule.

Proposed Schedule

Milestone	Date
Alpha Begins	Immediately (trunktrunk A directory in Subversion containing the latest development code in preparation for the next major release cycle. If you are running "trunk", then you are on the latest revision. was open on March 25th)
BetaBeta A pre-release of software that is given out to a large group of users to trial under real conditions. Beta versions have gone through alpha testing in-house and are generally fairly close in look, feel and function to the final product; however, design changes often occur as part of the process. 1	Tuesday, October 21
Beta 2	Tuesday, October 28
Beta 3	Tuesday, November 4
Release Candidaterelease candidate One of the final stages in the version release cycle, this version signals the potential to be a final release to the public. Also see alpha (beta). 1	Tuesday, November 11
Release Candidate 2	Tuesday, November 18
Release Candidate 3	Tuesday, November 25
Dry Run	Monday, December 1
Final Release	Tuesday, December 2

As always, all dates are subject to change based on development progress.

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Call for Volunteers

Each WordPress release depends on contributors from across the project coming together to make it a success.  As with the 6.7 and 6.8 release cycles, WordPress 6.9 will continue the approach of forming a smaller, focused Release Squad.  This streamlined structure places more emphasis on collaboration with the various Make Team Reps, who are encouraged to help coordinate efforts from within their respective teams.  The goal is to reduce the overhead on the Release Squad while still ensuring each team’s contributions and priorities are represented throughout the cycle.

If you’re interested in helping with WordPress 6.9 in one of the following roles, please comment below or reach out in the #6-9-release-leads SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel:

• Release LeadRelease Lead The community member ultimately responsible for the Release. – Matt Mullenweg
• Release Coordination – helps manage timelines, cross-team collaboration, and status updates
• Tech Leads – oversees coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. development (including GutenbergGutenberg The Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/), triagetriage The act of evaluating and sorting bug reports, in order to decide priority, severity, and other factors., and critical issues
• Design Lead – ensures consistent, user-focused experiences across new features
• Triage Lead – help monitor issues, shepherd patches, and guide contributors
• Test Lead – coordinates testing efforts across the community and test reports

Whether you’ve led a release before or are looking to get involved for the first time, there are many ways to contribute.  Volunteers of all experience levels are welcome!

If you’re interested in volunteering, please leave a comment below noting your preferred area(s) by Friday, July 25th.

Let’s build WordPress 6.9 together!

Props @annezazu @priethor @4thhubbard for reviewing this post.

#6-9, #planning