Imagine my excitement when A.M. Moscoso, who blogs at My Enduring Bones, commented on my rather whiney post about the WordPress Block editor that has been foisted upon us. She wrote:
“I went to the Dashboard and went to the Plugin category and found the classic editor plugin. It says it extends the screen, but all I know is my classic editor screen is back and I don’t see the block style. I think if you search for Classic Editor Plugin you’ll get more info. I found it on accident. But if you install it, you’ll be back to the format we like!”
Woo hoo! My prayers have been answered. All I have to do is go to my dashboard, click on Plugins…
…and I’m off and running, right?
Well, not exactly. You see, WordPress plugins are only available if you have the Business Plan.
And the Business Plan is only available if you are willing to fork over $25 a month! 
Well guess what, WordPress, I am not a business. I blog for fun, not to make money. I’m not selling anything. I don’t even have ads on my blog because I pay $4 a month for the Personal Plan precisely so ads don’t show up on my posts.
Come on, WordPress. How about cutting some slack to your casual bloggers instead of catering to businesses and professionals. Don’t foist things on us that we don’t want or need (e.g., the Block editor). Just give us what we hobby bloggers need to enjoy blogging instead of making it burdensome. Whaddya say, WordPress?
I am totally with you on this one!
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Argh. No fair.
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Yeah, I, too, have not been a fan of the Gutenberg interface.
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I hate to say this but I haven’t had any problems with the block editor, using my FREE blog. YET!!! I use my laptop though.
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Yeah, I think the Block editor user experience on a laptop is very different from the user experience on a smartphone.
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Must be!
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Yes, very, but it’s still shit. Fortunately for me, I found the “Code Editor” option rather than the “Visual Editor” mode, which is okay for me, since I usually write my posts using the Text/HTML editor view anyway, but even then, it makes changes to my html as it sees fit when I save or hit publish. I guess I’m just going to have to use the “classic” editor under the wp-admin dashboard.
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That’s what I’m doing (wp-admin Classic editor).
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What’s EVEN worse is that the block editor doesn’t work with many (if not most) of their templates. They don’t want us. What they don’t seem to get is that we are the people who bring readers to their sites. Without us, they’re just all ads all the time and all the casual viewers won’t be around.
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It’s nuts. If they’re going to offer plugins, why not charge a one-time fee and allow any plan level to purchase them. I might pay $25 or even $50 to keep the Classic editor via a one-time purchase, but not $25 a month for a Business Plan I don’t want or need.
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I have a solution that works for me. Open a new page and just type the title in. Save and close it.. Then go back and find it in your drafts and hit edit. When it comes in it will be in the old format.. try it and see if it works for you. It does for me. Or, I have a bunch of old drafts I never finished. If I go in and use them, erasing what I’ve formerly written, I can do a new blog in the old editor. Let me know if this works for you.
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Are you using an iPhone? I tried doing what you said, but when I opened up the title-only saved draft, it opened in the Block editor format.
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As I said earlier, I am still using the classic editor.
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I still hate the block editor, getting used to it but i still hate it! I only ever use my laptop for writing posts, too but don’t really have the time to search for ways to be able to access the classic editor. I don’t even truly understand what a plugin is 🙄😀
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Plugins are like apps for your blog. I’ve only used a couple. One is for a Halloween Countdown clock and the other was to access the older editor. There are more but those seem to serve blogs that drive and want to pull in and monitor traffic.
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Thanks 🙏
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I totally agree. There are many of us who blog for fun!
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I blog for fun and I wished my blog made money but it doesn’t.
I upgraded because I store a lot of media on my blog so I’m paying for that- when I’m traveling I can always access a computer but I don’t always want to take my laptop along so all of my drafts, projects and media are easy to access and I don’t miss a beat.
When I switched from BLogger to WordPress over 10 years ago the transition was PAINFUL but the more I used it and the more I experimented the easier it got.
I was using it and it was OK but because I had the option ( which as you see, does not come cheap ) I went with it.
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Amen, Fandango! It is already bad enough that they are forcing this block editor down the throat of people who blog for free… But to impose it to people that actually pay to blog? I am very disappointed, and I am keeping fingers crossed that our voice will be heard somehow. I have doubts, but who knows? If we don’t complain, they’ll always have their way, regardless what we think!
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Directed here from Renard’s World, and his post about the Block Editor. Going to be an interesting month or so of trying to get my head round the new format, or not!
Thanks
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Totally with you, Fandango. I have my first post in Classic Block coming out tomorrow. I managed to muddle through somewhat but I can’t imagine using it on a phone.
My title may not please the HEs.
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