WordPress 5.2 was released today, and among the many new features and updates is a new minimum PHP requirement.
PHP 5.6 is the new minimum WordPress requirement
WordPress has long supported older versions of PHP, with the previous minimum being 5.2.4. In the last year the core development team has begun making a push to get users to update their PHP versions for both performance and security reasons. Their current recommendation is that servers run PHP 7.3. With today’s release, the minimum version is PHP 5.6.
What if my site is using an older version?
If you are running a version of PHP less than 5.6, WordPress will not allow you to update the site. From the update page, you will see this:
Before you can update to WordPress 5.2 the server where the site is hosted will need to be updated.
How do I update PHP on for my site?
Updating PHP is not a hard process, but since the PHP version is set at the server level, you’ll need to either adjust the settings in your hosting account, or ask your web host to do it for you. WordPress has put together this handy guide on updating PHP, and it includes the how-to, the why’s, and the gotchas. Give that a read and if you still have questions you can certainly reach out to us (start a chat)
Can you do this for me?
If your site is still running on an older version of PHP, it’s likely that your host is out of step with the times. If you’d like us to handle this for you, we’d be happy to upgrade your hosting by migrating it to one of our servers. We keep them up to date and well provisioned for a superior service.
While you’re at it, you should give our maintenance service a try. All the regular maintenance is taken care of and our famous 30 minute fixes are included!
