WordPress 5.8 gets serious: Internet Explorer 11 (IE11) is no longer supported
The WordPress 5.8 update, released in July 2021, brings some very welcome improvements to the Gutenberg editor and better support for the “WebP” image format – but it also comes with an important piece of news that could affect small and medium-sized businesses in particular: Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 (IE11), released seven years ago, is no longer supported as of now. According to Statista, IE11's market share had already dropped below 1.5% by May 2021. Even so, there can still be audiences that rely heavily on Internet Explorer – a look at your web analytics data will tell you.
What does WordPress “ending support for IE11” actually mean?
What steps should WordPress website operators take now?
Free check: is your website affected by the update?
What does WordPress “ending support for IE11” actually mean?
When WordPress ends support for a browser, it means, for one thing, that new features are no longer tested on that browser, and there's no guarantee they'll still work properly there.
It also affects parts of WordPress's existing core functionality. Scripts that generate parts of the WordPress core source code are updated too, to exclude unsupported browsers and gain performance benefits. That means any feature relying on these generated files is likely to break, or simply stop working, for IE11 users. And, not least, bugs reported in connection with IE11 issues will no longer be fixed.
In practice, that can mean things like animations not running, a broken-looking design, or interactive content such as maps no longer working.
What steps should WordPress website operators take now?
As mentioned at the start, it's worth taking a look at your web analytics data (Matomo or Google Analytics, for example) to find out whether your specific audiences still use IE11.
If they do, we're happy to help you put together a message to your customers, recommending they switch to a more modern browser such as Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari or Microsoft Edge.
For the transition period, we at flame have also developed a quick fix: instead of a “blank” page or a generic error message when visiting a WordPress website (leaving users none the wiser that IE11 is to blame), a pop-up window appears explaining that the page can't be displayed correctly or in full because of IE11, and recommending a switch to a more modern browser to keep seeing the content going forward.
If you have any further questions about WordPress, WordPress themes or websites in general, just get in touch. As a WordPress agency in Munich, we're your go-to partner and are happy to help – including with live webinars and workshops.
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