WordPress celebrates its birthday this Saturday, on May 27. Year 2023 marks the 20th anniversary for WordPress – congratulations!
The global WordPress community celebrates this milestone with a number of different ways. For more information of what’s planned throughout the year, see wp20.wordpress.net.
From Blogs to the Most Popular CMS
WordPress was originally developed to manage blog content. Today, thanks to its customizability and numerous plugins, WordPress is the most popular content management system in the world. From small shops to big ecommerce sites, interactive learning experiences and online forums, WordPress is suitable for websites of all kinds.
The predecessor of WordPress is b2/cafelog, written by French developer Michel Valdrigh. Like WordPress, b2 was open source, but according to Matt Mullenweg, proved to be difficult to modify and configure. However, it was based on PHP and MySQL (which just turned 27 – congratulations, MySQL!).
Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little took b2 to their desks and thought about how b2 could be improved, and what a good content management system should feature. You can still read Matt Mullenweg’s original 2003 post about b2 on Matt’s blog.
This fork soon gave birth to WordPress. The first version was released on 27 May 2003. If you wish to learn about WordPress’ origins in detail, we recommend checking out an interview with Mullenweg from 2009.
WordPress – the World’s Most Popular CMS
In the 2010s WordPress’ popularity started to soar. As the number of plugins increased and the community grew, WordPress became more and more versatile. The possibilities of brought by plugins made WordPress easy to approach and to create spectacular websites, great for beginners and experienced developers alike. Thanks to the ever-growing community and open source philosophy, there’s an abundance of information and support readily available, whenever you need it.
How to Celebrate 20 Years of WordPress
WordPress Events
The 20th anniversary of WordPress is celebrated with a variety of events and meetups throughout the year. You can participate or organize your own event! Find out more about all the global events on the anniversary website, with information gathered by the WordPress community.
WordPress will be celebrated throughout 2023 with a variety of events. The 20th anniversary of WordPress was also celebrated at WordCamp in Lisbon on 19-20 May, which Seravo also attended. Stay tuned for our upcoming report of our first live WordCamp after a hiatus!
Two Decades’ Worth of Jazz
All WordPress versions are named after jazz musicians. Want to have something to listen to for the anniversary year? Check out the official WP20 playlist on Spotify and Apple Music. Links to the playlists can be found here!
Museum of Block Art
Discover artworks created with Gutenberg blocks in this online exhibition. You can also inspect the works and find out how they have been made, so have a look at and get inspired! Visit the Museum of Block Art at block-museum.com.
Swag & Selfies
What’s your fondest WordPress memory? Have you collected some great WordPress swag over the years? Share your content on social media with the hashtag #WP20. You can also download and print official selfie props for your next WordPress event or social media!
Seravo – Fast and Secure Home for Your WordPress Site
Seravo is celebrating 20 years of WordPress by participating and sponsoring events and meetups for the WordPress community. Next up is the magnificent WordCamp EU in Athens, 8-10 June – see you there!