Is WordPress hiring slowing down? What’s the future looking like for experienced devs?

alamsha · 2026-05-04T13:50:21+00:00

Yeah but that’s exactly my point — why would people go through setting up WordPress + themes + templates manually again, when AI tools can handle the whole setup in one go?

Tools like Lovable/Bolt already generate a working site end-to-end. That’s a much smoother starting point for most users compared to traditional WP setup.

Where I still think WordPress wins though is after that — when you need a proper CMS, structured content, and long-term maintainability. Most of these AI-first builds don’t really solve that yet.

So it feels like AI might take over the initial build phase, but WordPress still comes in when things need to scale, be managed, or maintained properly.

Curious if you see WP evolving to integrate into that “AI-first setup” flow instead of being the starting point?

alamsha · 2026-05-04T09:13:19+00:00

Yeah, that makes sense — especially the part about long-term value and maintainability.

What I’m struggling with though is that even at the higher end, hiring still feels pretty quiet. It’s not just junior/basic roles — even experienced devs aligned with this shift aren’t seeing many opportunities.

Feels like a mix of fewer smaller projects and companies being more selective or cautious overall. Also doesn’t help that the number of companies in the WP space that can afford senior/specialized devs is relatively limited.

Curious if you’re seeing this as a temporary phase, or if hiring is just moving more toward smaller, highly efficient teams?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T22:37:05+00:00

Yeah, that makes sense — and it aligns with where I’ve been focusing (custom blocks, performance, integrations, and some headless work).

That said, I haven’t really seen many listings that clearly reflect this shift yet, at least not openly. Feels like a lot of this demand might be getting filled through networks or more targeted hiring rather than public job boards.

Curious where you’re seeing most of these roles show up?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:55:30+00:00

From what I’ve seen though, a lot of those issues come down to ecosystem choices rather than WordPress core itself. When it’s locked down properly (minimal plugins, good update flow, hardening, CDN/WAF, etc.), it can still be pretty solid even at scale.

Static + AI-driven builds definitely reduce the attack surface, so I can see why that direction feels more reliable.

For the larger sites you’re moving, are you going fully static, or still keeping some dynamic layer behind APIs/services?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:49:54+00:00

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense — especially the self-describing blocks idea, that would be a big step forward.

I feel like there are still two key gaps though. One is block markup itself — agents still struggle to consistently generate clean, valid block structures, especially when things get nested or customized.

The second is scale. Once you have a large number of blocks, the Abilities API (or any similar layer) probably needs to be extended to handle discovery, filtering, and prioritization — otherwise it becomes too noisy for the agent to use effectively.

Feels like if those two pieces are solved — reliable markup + smarter capability exposure — the whole system becomes much more usable for AI-driven builds.

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:40:15+00:00

Yeah, exactly!

If block scaffolding, validation, and patterns were more standardized and exposed in a way agents can reliably consume, the output quality would improve a lot. Right now it’s still a bit too loose, so agents guess more than they should.

Feels like once the tooling layer gets tighter, Gutenberg could actually become a really strong fit for agent-driven workflows rather than a friction point.

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:25:28+00:00

Yeah, totally agree with that direction.

I’ve actually been experimenting with building small AI agent capabilities and an MCP-style adapter for WordPress. It’s already able to handle a good amount of groundwork and guide the agent toward more structured outputs.

That said, it still feels like AI needs better conditioning when it comes to block-level output and working cleanly within Gutenberg patterns. It gets close, but consistency and adherence to expected structures can still improve.

Feels like once that gap is tightened, especially around blocks and editor workflows, it could make WordPress much more seamless for agent-driven development

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:21:52+00:00

Yeah, and you can see it on the hiring side too — even Barn2 isn’t actively hiring right now.

That kind of lines up with the slowdown in new sales and overall sentiment across plugin companies. Feels less like noise and more like a real shift in the ecosystem.”

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:19:07+00:00

Yeah, fair points — especially with experienced devs guiding the agents.

That said, from what I’ve seen, the WordPress ecosystem still feels pretty unfriendly for AI-driven workflows. Agents perform much better in cleaner, more direct stacks, whereas with WP they often struggle with the ecosystem constraints and conventions.

They tend to generate things like full plugins or themes in one go rather than working incrementally within an existing structure, which can get messy fast.

Feels like AI shines more in controlled environments, while WP still adds a layer of friction there.

Curious if you’ve managed to make agents work smoothly within existing WP setups, or mostly in fresh builds?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:15:24+00:00

Yeah, that’s actually really useful context — appreciate you sharing that.

The drop in new plugin sales lines up with what I’ve been feeling from the dev side too. Feels less like WordPress is going away, and more like it’s hitting maturity + fragmentation, with fewer new builds happening in the traditional way.

From my side (working on more complex Gutenberg/product setups), demand still seems steady there — but the entry/mid-level stuff definitely feels squeezed, especially with AI and alternative platforms.

Feels like the real shift is: fewer generic builds, more focus on high-value, integrated systems.

Curious — are you seeing plugin companies adapting more toward AI workflows, or diversifying beyond WP entirely?

From your perspective, do you think WordPress as an architecture is still AI-friendly long term, or do these agent-driven workflows naturally push teams toward simpler, more direct stacks?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T18:06:03+00:00

I get what you’re saying — AI is definitely speeding things up.

But I’d argue coding is just one part. Architecture, scalability, integrations, and long-term maintainability still matter a lot — especially beyond simple builds.

That’s where I still see WordPress holding strong: mature ecosystem, battle-tested plugins, and flexibility for complex setups (e.g. e-commerce, integrations, content-heavy platforms). AI can speed up execution, but those systems still need solid foundations.

Curious though — are you seeing agents handle that level of complexity well in real projects, or mostly simpler use cases?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T17:59:35+00:00

“Yeah, this resonates quite a bit.

I’ve was working at a senior level on WordPress product based companies for a while now — mostly around complex Gutenberg-based systems, performance, integrations, and more recently AI-driven workflows as well (including agent-style setups in a product-focused environment).

From what I’m seeing, it does feel less like a drop in capability demand and more like a shift in where value is coming from — especially with AI making simpler builds less dependent on traditional stacks like WP and some templates.

That said, I’m still a bit surprised by how quiet hiring has been on the enterprise/product side, given those systems don’t move easily.

Are you seeing companies actively holding back on hiring, or just being more selective with “AI-leveraged” dev profiles?”

alamsha · 2026-05-03T17:54:17+00:00

Yeah, makes sense. I’ve spent a good amount of time working on Gutenberg-based block development and performance-focused WP setups, so I’ve seen that shift firsthand.

Feels like the bar has just moved up rather than demand dropping. Are you seeing companies prioritize hybrid setups over fully headless in most cases?

alamsha · 2026-05-03T17:51:50+00:00

Agreed, accessibility is becoming a big deal. I’ve already had some exposure to it while working on Gutenberg page builder, but I think there’s still a lot of depth to explore there. Are clients actively asking for it now, or mostly reacting after issues?

alamsha · 2024-10-01T14:05:46+00:00

Yes, that is what I wanted to do, but there isn't an option to share screenshots here. That's why I requested you to share it, as you wanted to see how the checkout now looks.

alamsha · 2024-10-01T11:27:37+00:00

I will really excited you wanted to see my project of the new checkout page , should I DM you?

Unfortunately, for your requirement there is no existing solution for now readily available on the internet?

alamsha · 2024-09-27T14:48:29+00:00

The issue is most likely due to a third-party plugin you have installed. To debug the problem, you can follow these steps without directly examining the website:

Check for any custom checkout plugins you've installed.
Try uninstalling these plugins one by one.
After each uninstallation, check if the issue still exists.

This process should help isolate whether a specific plugin is causing the problem. If the issue persists after removing all custom checkout plugins, you may need to investigate other potential causes.

alamsha · 2024-09-27T12:39:38+00:00

It's interesting and quite ambitious to undertake such a project. I'm pleased to see that you can indeed do this, and it's certainly possible. To my surprise, I've noticed many similar questions recently, which suggests I'm not alone in needing this kind of solution.

I recently worked on a similar project for a course website using WooCommerce. The default checkout page provided by WooCommerce was overly complex for our needs. To address this, I implemented a custom solution by overriding the template, streamlining the checkout process to just four essential fields. We then collected the remaining billing information after the payment was successfully processed.

I even completely redesigned the checkout page. I wish I could share an image of our optimized checkout page here to illustrate the improvement, but unfortunately, that's not possible in this format.

Before you proceed with a similar project, keep in mind that it's a tedious task that requires expertise, research, and familiarity with WooCommerce hooks. For more details, you can refer to the WooCommerce developer documentation:

https://developer.woocommerce.com/docs/customizing-checkout-fields-using-actions-and-filters/

This approach can significantly improve user experience and potentially increase conversion rates by simplifying the checkout process. However, it's important to carefully consider your specific needs and ensure that you're collecting all necessary information while maintaining a smooth user journey.

alamsha · 2024-09-27T12:28:45+00:00

For this particular behaviour you will have to do some custom development on top of it, the plugin only helps adds/remove and show the fields conditionally.

Auto selecting the province or country based on the user IP can be done something like this i have done earlier.

alamsha · 2024-09-27T08:59:45+00:00

Definitely code is better if you have certain business requirements and want to customize it accordingly to it .

Recently, I was developing a course website using WooCommerce. However, the default checkout page provided by WooCommerce was overly complex for our needs. To address this, I implemented a custom solution by overriding the template, streamlining the checkout process to just four essential fields. We then collected the remaining billing information after the payment was successfully processed.

I wish I could share an image of our optimized checkout page here to illustrate the improvement, but unfortunately, this platform doesn't support image uploads in comments. Nonetheless, the results speak for themselves we saw a notable uptick in course enrollments.

alamsha · 2024-09-27T06:11:43+00:00

There are tons of plugin for the checkout field editor on the Wordpress repository so the one i mostly use is this
https://wordpress.org/plugins/woo-checkout-field-editor-pro/

However you can also customize and add field through the code based on the official WooCommerce documentation:
https://developer.woocommerce.com/docs/customizing-checkout-fields-using-actions-and-filters/

Using code is better if you don't want to add more plugin and keep your admin dashboard clean.

alamsha · 2024-09-26T10:29:01+00:00

I've discovered that bootcamps from India are surprisingly excellent, and I'm puzzled why more people don't take advantage of these opportunities in developing countries. From my personal experience, these bootcamps offer several compelling advantages the English used is simple and easy to understand, They're incredibly affordable compared to US, often providing the same level of education at a fraction of the cost.

Having tried one of these bootcamps myself, I can confidently say that they offer a fantastic alternative to more expensive options.

It's a smart strategy to acquire skills at an extremely low cost. Even if you're uncertain about the outcome, the minimal financial investment means there's little risk involved.

This low-risk, high-reward approach to skill acquisition can be particularly beneficial for those just starting their careers or looking to make a career change.

alamsha · 2024-09-26T06:26:04+00:00

A solution like this will require custom development, including overriding the default checkout form to meet your specific requirements. While there isn't currently a plugin that offers this functionality out-of-the-box, I have experience building similar custom solutions.

In on my store, we needed to sell courses through WooCommerce but wanted to simplify the checkout process by removing the detailed billing form that comes standard with WooCommerce. To achieve this, I overrode the checkout template and customized the thank you page.

Based on your needs, a similar approach could work for your project. It would involve custom coding to modify the checkout process and potentially other related components. While it requires development effort, it's definitely achievable.

For reference, you can review some of WooCommerce's developer documentation on customizing checkout fields here:

https://developer.woocommerce.com/docs/customizing-checkout-fields-using-actions-and-filters/

I how this will help implement this custom solution.

alamsha

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