Maybe It's Not WordPress That's Declining

Maybe It’s Not WordPress That’s Declining

I watched a spat unfold on X recently. It wasn’t pretty, but then again, X rarely is. The argument was between people who genuinely care about the web, specifically about WordPress. The bone of contention? Classic WordPress versus modern block themes.

Here’s the thing though: I’m not sure they were arguing about the right problem.

The Numbers Tell a Different Story

We’ve all lived through the past few years. The global crisis might feel like old news, but its effects are still playing out in ways we’re only just starting to notice. So I went looking at the stats, curious about what’s actually happening with how people use the internet.

In 2020, mobile users were spending about four hours a day online. Nothing surprising there. But here’s what caught my attention: 90% of that time was spent inside apps, not mobile browsers. Not on websites. In apps. Reference

Think about that for a second. Nearly nine out of ten mobile users aren’t browsing the web in any traditional sense. They’re locked into closed ecosystems, moving between Instagram, TikTok, Gmail, Slack, whatever. The actual web browser? It’s becoming a secondary tool.

The Real Question

So maybe the “decline” everyone’s arguing about isn’t really about WordPress at all. Maybe it’s not about whether block themes are better than classic themes, or whether Gutenberg was the right move. Maybe we’re just watching the slow shift of user behaviour away from websites altogether.

I know we’ve been saying “mobile first” since the early 2000s. But there’s a fundamental difference between building a mobile-responsive website and building an app. They’re not the same thing. You either build a website or you build an app. And if most people are spending their time in apps, well, that changes the game entirely.

The question isn’t whether WordPress is declining. The question is whether the way we use the internet is changing so fundamentally that traditional website building matters less than it used to.

What WordPress Is Actually Doing

Here’s where it gets interesting. While everyone’s busy arguing about themes and editors, WordPress is quietly working on something called the Abilities API.

Instead of relying on REST, or the traditional hooks and actions system, the Abilities API standardises how WordPress handles internal plugins, themes, permissions, and data references. It’s a paradigm shift in how the platform operates under the hood.

This isn’t about making things prettier or easier for beginners. This is about WordPress adapting to how modern web technology actually works. It’s innovation at the infrastructure level.

Maybe We’re Missing the Point

Look, I’ll leave the dogmatic arguments and the Twitter drama to people who have more time for that sort of thing. What interests me is the bigger picture.

If 90% of mobile internet time is happening inside apps, then arguing about WordPress theme adoption is a bit like rearranging deck chairs. The real conversation should be about how platforms like WordPress evolve to stay relevant when the internet itself is being used differently.

The Abilities API suggests WordPress is thinking about this. They’re building for a future where data access, interoperability, and standardisation matter more than which editor you prefer.

That’s worth paying attention to.

What do you think? Are we focusing on the wrong battles?

Stilman Davis

November 14, 2025

Are all these apps “social media”? That is the question.

By only using these “apps” are we limiting ourselves to particular sources of information? Tim Berners-Lee and the other internet pioneers were opening up the world of information, not monetising the electronic landscape. The internet was supposed to provide access to libraries, publicly available stores of information, not stores through which you had to pay for access. That happened later when companies realised they could do unspeakable things with browsers (witness the departure from standards in those “browser wars”).

By using apps only, users stitch themselves into particular ways of looking at the world. Employing the browser forces the user to look in different places for information with their own viewpoints and the user has to evaluate what is being offered. Outside of the apps, the user has to decide which website is a reliable resource. When we are inside an app, we are don’t evaluate and we are forced into a particular interpretive framework and we do not realise the variety of untapped information floating in the ether (both good and bad sources).

However, using a browser in this independent way makes the individual even more responsible for his browsing and the independent content provider has to stand up for the truth of what has been published.

It may well be that WordPress is managing the infrastructure in a new way and I will have to look into that. But “content is king” as they used to say when the internet began. That is what should be our focus, not the means through which we massage our message, no matter how much fun playing with blocks really is.

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elliott richmond