As the open web enters the AI era, WordPress is stepping up to lead the next wave of innovation. The platform that helped democratize publishing is now building the technical infrastructure to democratize artificial intelligence—so anyone, from developers to site owners, can harness the power of AI to improve experiences and streamline workflows.
To make this vision a reality, the WordPress project has introduced a new initiative: AI Building Blocks. These foundational projects are being developed to enable flexible, secure, and powerful AI integrations across the WordPress ecosystem.
Next, let’s look at what AI Building Blocks are, how they work, and why they matter.
What Are AI Building Blocks?
The AI Building Blocks are a collection of open-source projects designed to bring AI capabilities into WordPress. They’re not just proof-of-concept features—they’re infrastructure.
These tools are designed to support both plugin developers and core contributors by providing reusable components for building intelligent workflows, AI assistants, content generation tools, and more.
The initiative currently focuses on three key projects and four deliverables, each serving a specific role while working seamlessly together.
The Core Building Blocks
1. PHP AI Client SDK
At the heart of this initiative is the PHP AI Client SDK, a unified abstraction layer that enables easy connection to large language models (LLMs) and embedding models, regardless of the provider. Whether you’re working with OpenAI, Anthropic, or another LLM, this SDK simplifies the implementation process while giving users flexibility over which model to use.
It’s being developed in two parts:
- A platform-agnostic Composer package, built with the broader PHP community.
- A WordPress-specific package, which adds REST endpoints, API key management, and native WordPress integrations.
This dual-package approach ensures compatibility across the PHP ecosystem while delivering a tailored experience for WordPress developers.
2. Abilities API
Think of the Abilities API as a unified control panel for everything WordPress can do.
It registers WordPress functions, APIs, and capabilities into a centralized, discoverable system—essentially giving AI agents and automation tools a roadmap to interact with WordPress programmatically. From WP-CLI commands to custom plugin logic, everything can be documented and queried through this API.
This marks a shift away from scattered function calls toward a more modern, semantic structure that’s machine-readable and AI-friendly.
3. MCP Adapter
The MCP Adapter connects WordPress to external AI agents, such as Claude or ChatGPT, by translating the abilities defined in WordPress into the Model Context Protocol (MCP) format.
This enables third-party AI agents to interact safely and intelligently with WordPress functionality through predefined endpoints. Rather than hard-coding integrations, WordPress uses adapters to flexibly support current and future standards.
The MCP Adapter is just the beginning—future protocols will be added in the same modular fashion, ensuring long-term scalability and flexibility.
4. AI Experiments Plugin
Serving as both a showcase and a sandbox, the AI Experiments Plugin combines all three components above into a unified toolset for users and developers alike.
It provides a space to test AI-powered workflows, preview experimental features, and see how everything fits together. From visual builders to agent-based interactions, the plugin acts as a live demonstration of what the AI Building Blocks can do before they’re merged into Core or turned into Canonical Plugins.
Why This Matters: From Core Philosophy to Real-World Use Cases
WordPress’s approach to AI development reflects a deeper strategy: build first as Composer packages, experiment via canonical plugins, and merge to Core only when stable and widely adopted.
This protects flexibility for developers while maintaining high standards for end users.
By the time WordPress 7.0 arrives, the initiative aims to deliver value across the ecosystem:
- Developers will gain access to drop-in AI features for plugin and theme development.
- Enterprises can leverage secure, scalable integrations with their preferred AI providers.
- Content teams will benefit from intelligent assistants, smart media tools, and real-time collaboration capabilities.
Learn How We Integrated AI into Real-World WordPress Builds
Future AI Use Cases in WordPress
AI-Powered Site Admin Interface
The new Site Admin UI presents an opportunity to surface AI capabilities natively. Imagine spinning up chatbots, defining intelligent workflows, or launching agent-based automations without writing a single line of code. With Building Blocks integrated under the hood, AI becomes a seamless part of the admin experience.
AI-Assisted Real-Time Collaboration
Instead of just collaborating with people, why not collaborate with AI?
Within the Post Editor, the Abilities API could enable AI to join a comment thread, suggest revisions, or autonomously resolve feedback. This reimagines editorial workflows and supports asynchronous, AI-assisted collaboration.
Smarter Media Library
The Media Library is ripe for intelligent upgrades. Potential features include:
- AI-generated alt text and captions
- Multimodal search across image and text
- Smart grouping and categorization
- AI-based content enhancement
These small yet meaningful features can significantly enhance content discoverability and accessibility.
Built for Flexibility, Built for the Future
What makes the AI Building Blocks initiative so forward-thinking is its commitment to extensibility and openness.
By decoupling functionality into reusable Composer packages, developers don’t have to wait for official Core releases. They can start building today knowing their tools are future-proof and aligned with WordPress’s long-term vision.
At the same time, discussions are underway to determine how much of this functionality should be incorporated into WordPress Core.
How to Get Involved
The future of this work depends on community collaboration. If you’re building with WordPress or exploring AI, there’s a place for you to contribute.
- Join the discussion in the #core-ai channel on WordPress Slack.
- Follow and contribute to the GitHub repositories under the WordPress organization.
- Participate in Hallway Hangouts and Core proposals as decisions about AI adoption and standards unfold.
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