In episode 122 of the GT Changelog podcast, host Birgit Pauli-Haack is joined by Beth Soderbergh, CEO of bethink Studio, to discuss the latest updates in Gutenberg 21.8 and WordPress 6.9. The conversation kicks off with reminiscing about past WordCamp experiences and transitions into a deep dive on block themes, evolving design tools, and the challenges of adopting new workflows. Beth shares practical insights from her agency work, highlighting the benefits of section and block styles, synced patterns, and strategies for cleaning up legacy code as Gutenberg advances.

The episode covers new features like section styles, the highly anticipated accordion block, and improvements to template management, aimed at making theme and site building more flexible for users and developers. They also talk about experimental features such as PHP-only blocks, block bindings, and upcoming blocks like breadcrumbs and table of contents, which promise to streamline site navigation and content organization.

Birgit and Beth underscore the importance of continuous testing and learning, encouraging listeners—especially those hesitant to adopt block themes—to experiment, seek support, and embrace gradual change. The episode wraps with practical advice, recent security updates, and a look at promising innovations coming to the WordPress ecosystem.

Show Notes / Transcript

• Editor: Sandy Reed
• Logo: Mark Uraine
• Production: Birgit Pauli-Haack

Show Notes

Special Guest: Beth Soderberg

• Bethink Studio
• WordPress.org Profile + Slack
• Talks by Beth Soderberg
  • My Process for Building a Custom WordPress Theme in 2025
  • Bill Erickson,Ellen Bauer, Beth Soderberg: Case Studies – How to Prepare your Theme for Gutenberg
  • And more

Calls for Testing WordPress 6.9 

• Template management 
• Ability to Hide Blocks
• Accordion Block

Community Contributions

• Block Galore by designers and developers using Automattic’s Telex 
• Moar Blocks

What’s Released

• WordPress 6.8.3
• What’s new in Gutenberg 21.8? (8 October)

New Blocks still in the works

• Time to Read (m) 
• Accordion Block (m) 
• Breadcrumbs Block (m)
• Terms Query block (m) 
• Dialog Block 
• Icon Block
• Stretchy Text
• Tabs Block
• Table of Contents block

= already merged into trunk, as experiments.

Stay in Touch

Transcript

The transcript is in the works.