Upgrading to v27

If you are migrating from WordPress to Altis, check out the migrating guide first.

To upgrade to Altis v27, edit your composer.json and change the version constraint for altis/altis and any local environment modules to ^27.0.0.

{
    "require": {
        "altis/altis": "^27.0.0"
    },
    "require-dev": {
        "altis/local-server": "^27.0.0"
    },
    "config": {
        "platform": {
            "php": "8.4"
        }
    }
}

Once you have made these changes, run composer update and then run the wp altis migrate command:

# For cloud environments
wp altis migrate

# For local server
composer server cli -- altis migrate

WordPress 7.0 "Armstrong"

This release marks the beginning of a new era for WordPress — laying the foundation for AI across the platform, introducing a modernized admin experience, and shipping a broad set of new design and developer tools.

  • WP AI Client — A central hub for connecting AI providers (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google) directly to your site, managed via

Settings > Connectors. Plugins can communicate with AI models through a unified interface without building their own integrations.

  • Modernized Admin Dashboard — A refreshed color palette, higher contrast, and upgraded typography across the entire admin,

with smooth view transitions between screens (respecting reduced motion preferences).

  • Command Palette — Access any admin tool or screen instantly with ⌘K / Ctrl+K from anywhere in the dashboard.

For more details check the WordPress 7.0 Field Guide

Headline Features

  • Improved environment syncing The new Environment sync tool now implements faster stream copying between environments (e.g. prod to stage) with the option to run post-syncing commands (e.g. search/replace). You can also create an export to use in Local Server.

  • PHP 8.5 is now available, the new default version is PHP 8.4 and the minimum required version is PHP 8.2. See Updating PHP version for the full compatibility chart.

  • CI moved to GitHub Actions (Developer Tools module) Altis module CI has migrated from Travis CI to GitHub Actions. Each module repo now uses .github/workflows/ci.yml, a thin caller for the shared reusable workflow at humanmade/altis-dev-tools/.github/workflows/module-ci.yml.

    For projects you build on top of Altis, no action is required. Travis CI remains a fully supported option — your existing .travis.yml will continue to work. The skeleton no longer ships a Travis template by default, but you can keep maintaining one yourself; the composer dev-tools phpunit / composer dev-tools codecept run commands and the CI environment overrides documented in Continuous Integration work identically under either CI.

    If you'd like to migrate your own project to GitHub Actions, the Continuous Integration guide has a starter ci.yml template that wires up the new altis-ci.yml reusable workflow with DOCKER_USERNAME / DOCKER_PASSWORD secrets.

Altis Dashboard Features

  • The overhauled Environment syncing now uses faster parallel streaming to speed up the syncing. You can select what to sync (database / uploads / both), as well as run post-sync actions (e.g. search / replace) after the sync is complete.
  • The Export feature has also been enhanced. You can select what to export (database / uploads / both), and the exported archive can then be imported into Altis Local Server.
  • You now have the ability to block requests by User-Agent - useful for filtering requests which match specific strings or patterns.
  • Some environment notifications are now dynamic (like an out of date Altis version), so they will self-clear once the prescribed action has been taken.
  • As usual, we have updated dependencies to incorporate security patches and bug fixes

Altis Local Server Improvements

  • Local server now supports MySQL 8.4. You can read a summary of what's changed in the What Is New in MySQL 8.4 since MySQL 8.0 guide.
  • If you have added your own custom containers to local server, we now support wildcard host matching.
  • You can now import a full or partial export (database / uploads / both) from an Altis Environment in Local Server, using the composer server import <file> command.

Breaking changes

  • Removed altis-reusable-blocks module

Given almost all the functionality is now available via the block editor, we no longer install it by default. You can install the plugin manually if you wish to continue using this feature.

Altis Core improvements

We have incorporated many updates to modules and libraries in Altis to bring in important bug fixes and improvements.

Documentation

Our developer focused documentation has been improved again. As usual, feedback from our customers and partners is always welcome. Please send us any feedback you have.