On-demand webinar: WordPress trends & takeaways from WordCamp Europe 2025

Speaker 0 (Kristina):

[00:00:00]

Hello everyone, and welcome to today’s webinar: Top WordPress Trends and Takeaways from WordCamp EU 2025, brought to you by Liquid Web. I’m Kristina, and I’ll be kicking us off.

Thanks so much for joining us! We’re excited to have you here. For those unfamiliar with Liquid Web, we’re a premium hosting provider serving businesses of all sizes. We offer everything from dedicated servers to cloud and WordPress hosting, all supported 24/7.

A few quick housekeeping notes:

• The webinar will run about an hour, maybe a little over.
• Please use the Q&A function to submit your questions throughout the session. We’ll address them toward the end.
• This session is being recorded, and we’ll send out the recording and slides afterward.

Now, I’m happy to introduce today’s speakers: Kyleigh Fitzgerald from Liquid Web and David Johnson from StellarWP. Take it away, Kyleigh and David.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Thanks so much, Kristina! Hi everyone, thanks again for joining us. I’m Kyleigh Fitzgerald, Director of Product Marketing at Liquid Web. I’m joined by David Johnson. David, would you like to introduce yourself?

Speaker 2 (David):
Sure! I’m David Johnson, Brand Bard for StellarWP. And yes, this is indeed a live video, someone just asked that in the Q&A!

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Yes, it’s live! And we’ll also be doing a live demo today, so stay tuned. But first, David, what were your impressions of WordCamp EU this year? Was it your first time?

Speaker 2 (David):
It was my first time at WordCamp EU, although I’ve attended many WordCamps over the years. This one felt much larger than WordCamp US, more attendees, more energy, and incredibly well organized. I was also pleasantly surprised by how many people spoke English, and I really enjoyed the opportunity to connect with so many familiar faces from the global WordPress community.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
That’s awesome. It was actually my first WordCamp ever, and I found it very community-driven. It was great to meet the people who are truly doing the work — developers, marketers, and builders behind WordPress-powered sites. The energy was incredible.

Speaker 2 (David):
Absolutely. WordCamps have this welcoming vibe, whether it’s your first or tenth. I also loved finally meeting some folks who are usually based in Europe and not at US-based events.

Agenda overview

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Let’s walk through what we’ll cover today:

1. Key Trends from WordCamp EU – including sustainability, accessibility, inclusion, business strategy, and emerging tech like AI.
2. Takeaways from talks – what stood out and how they relate to your WordPress practice.
3. Live demo – of StellarSites, which we showcased at WordCamp.
4. Wrap-up – why Liquid Web and StellarWP are trusted WordPress partners.

Let’s dive into the trends, starting with sustainability.

[00:06:58]

Sustainability in WordPress

I attended Charlotte Bax’s’ session on building sustainable websites. She made a compelling case for minimizing our environmental impact by optimizing what we put on a page. That includes:

• Compressing images using formats like WebP.
• Lazy-loading media to reduce unnecessary data transfers.
• Auditing code and removing unused themes/plugins.
• Minimizing scripts and animations, especially those that could negatively affect users with sensory sensitivities.

She also recommended using tools like Website Carbon and EcoGrader to measure your site’s digital footprint. Sustainable sites are not only faster but also more accessible and user-friendly.

David, you were there too, right?

Speaker 2 (David):
Yes! She actually gave a shout-out to Kadence WP, one of our themes, as an example of a lightweight and efficient option. It was great to see a StellarWP product recognized.

[00:09:30]

Accessibility and inclusion

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Three standout talks were by Virginia Ciambriello, Jeff Chi, and Annelies Verhelst.

• Virginia emphasized how poor design can be dangerous for users with epilepsy or nystagmus.
• Jeff pushed for accessible code, including semantic HTML, proper labeling, and visible focus states.
• Annelies highlighted the urgency of the European Accessibility Act (EAA), which takes effect on June 28. She advised auditing your site and publishing an accessibility statement as a start.

Accessible design is human-centered design.

Speaker 2 (David):
These sessions really drove home how accessibility needs to be part of every build, not an afterthought. It’s something I plan to invest more time in.

[00:12:10]

Building inclusive communities

Speakers like Ignacio Márquez and Kirsty Burgoine spoke about:

• Elevating micro-communities — smaller, focused groups that drive deeper engagement.
• Creating safe spaces with visible codes of conduct, inclusive language, and platform accessibility.
• Featuring diverse voices in content — blog posts, case studies, interviews, etc.

Inclusion must be intentional and ongoing.

[00:14:45]

Business & strategy

Key takeaways:

• Sandra Kurze emphasized standardizing workflows and automating site builds to scale web-as-a-service models.
• Richard van Denderen reminded us that backups are strategic assets, not a “set-it-and-forget-it” tool.
• Karin Christen delivered a strong session on headless WordPress, showcasing a Swiss apprenticeship app built with WordPress as a backend and modern frameworks on the front end.
  

David, thoughts?

Speaker 2 (David):

The headless session was excellent. It showed how public institutions are balancing UX and flexibility using WordPress with REST APIs. She also highlighted that headless comes with higher maintenance costs, so it’s important to weigh the benefits carefully.

[00:19:00]

AI and emerging tech

Speakers like Marcel Tannich, Jason Mayes, and Marie-Charlotte Pezé covered:

• AI-powered automation using WP-CLI and LLMs for faster workflows.
• Client-side AI for personalized UX.
• Emphasis on content quality over volume — optimize for search experience, not just keywords.
• Preparing for the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA), which requires secure-by-design digital products.

David, you dug into CRA quite a bit, right?

Speaker 2 (David):
Yes, CRA is like GDPR but for security. If you build or sell websites into the EU, you’re responsible for maintaining compliance, including Software Bills of Materials (SBOMs). This will impact everyone, from agencies to plugin vendors. Start preparing now.

[00:30:59]

Fireside Chat, FAIR, and the future

There was also buzz around:

• The FAIR project (Federated and Independent Repository), backed by the Linux Foundation, an alternative distribution model for WordPress plugins/themes.
• Matt Mullenweg and Mary Hubbard’s fireside chat, which discussed:
  • The Campus Connect program.
  • Delayed release of WordPress 6.9 until 2026.
  • AI’s impact on plugin submissions and the need for responsible development.
  • A thoughtful but noncommittal response from Matt on FAIR’s future.

[00:39:46]

StellarSites live demo

We then did a live demo of StellarSites, an all-in-one WordPress solution combining:

• Optimized hosting via Liquid Web.
• Built-in premium tools (e.g., Kadence, LearnDash).
• Solid Security Pro, performance boosts via Cloudflare Enterprise.
• A powerful AI wizard for building branded websites quickly and beautifully.
  

David showed how to go from idea to full website draft in minutes — great for freelancers, creators, and agencies alike.

[00:59:30]

Why choose Liquid Web & StellarWP?

Liquid Web offers:

• Fully managed WordPress hosting.
• Developer tools like SSH, WP-CLI, and Git.
• 24/7 expert support.
• Scalable solutions, from single sites to dedicated servers.
  

StellarWP provides:

• Premium plugins (GiveWP, LearnDash, SolidWP, Kadence, etc.).
• Unified billing.
• AI-powered site building.
• Built-in security, performance, and updates.

To learn more, scan the QR codes on-screen or email us at [email protected].

Speaker 0 (Kristina):
Okay, great. Thank you so much, Kyleigh and David. Do you have time to answer a few of these questions?

Speaker 2 (David):
Absolutely. Yeah. Let’s dive in.

Audience Q&A

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Yeah. Absolutely. So I’ll try to go through and read them, and maybe you can answer them because it looks like they are about Stellar WP, which is awesome. Thank you, guys.

Um, so Bob asked us, can I move the site once it’s built to a different hosting provider?

Speaker 2 (David):
Yeah. Absolutely. So that’s a great question, and I think I saw something that was kind of related, like, can I install third-party plugins? And, uh, the answer is absolutely yes. Like, this is a WordPress site. All we’ve done is accelerate, if you use the AI wizard, all we’ve done is accelerate the process of getting you going.

But you’re not obligated to continue to use StellarSites as your hosting if you prefer to do something different. Now, our goal is to give you so much value that you don’t have a good reason to go elsewhere.

But yes, if you wanna take the site with you, it’s a WordPress site — you know, download a backup. We use, you know, Solid Central for management, Solid Backups NextGen, which is a cloud-based backup solution. You can download a zip, take it with you, and upload that zip — restore your backup at some other host — and you’re back up and running.

The thing that you’ll just wanna remember is, of course, because we’ve handled all the licensing for the premium tools, any of those premium tools that you wanna keep.

So let’s say you don’t want all of them, you just want the Kadence theme, you can just license that independently.

So yes, no vendor lock-in. It’s truly a WordPress site. Anything you can do with WordPress, you can do with a StellarSites site as well.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Awesome. Um, then Alex asked, how do you compare with Liquid Web managed hosting for WordPress? I feel like that’s an easy one to answer.

Speaker 2 (David):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, under the hood, we run on Liquid Web hardware, we run in a Liquid Web data center. We use a lot of the Liquid Web expertise and team.

But we’ve also added some optimizations. So depending on which package you purchase from Liquid Web or Nexcess, you may or may not get something that’s pretty close. But StellarSites does have its own customizations and optimizations.

There are server-side and management tools you might get with other Liquid Web products that we simplify for StellarSites users. So it really depends on your needs.

If you have something specific, happy to have a conversation about that offline.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Thank you so much. Um, then Kathy asked, is Stellar WP ADA compliant?

Speaker 2 (David):
ADA compliant. Oh, this is an interesting question, Kathy. I appreciate the question. I think we would need to know more about what you mean.

ADA compliance happens in multiple layers. If you’re asking “is the stellarwp.com website ADA compliant?” I sure hope so, I don’t actually know.

But are the products themselves ADA compliant? That varies within our product line. Some plugins don’t impact the front end — like Solid Security — so ADA compliance wouldn’t really apply.

We encourage feedback and our teams are committed to improving accessibility across our tools.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Then, another question: Where are the Stellar generated site images pulled from? Are they AI generated?

Speaker 2 (David):
Oh, no. No AI images in there. They are pulled from Pexels, so they are royalty-free stock photos. You can use them if you want to—no licensing issues. They’re there for design placeholders, but you’re welcome to launch with them.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Alright. And I said that and then you answered that one pretty quickly. I’ll just do this last one that Kathy just submitted.

She said, does Stellar do automatic plugin updates?

Speaker 2 (David):
Oh, I’m so glad you asked this. The answer is absolutely yes. This is truly a fully managed experience.

Not only do your plugins get updated automatically, but there’s also visual regression testing—so if an update changes your site’s appearance significantly, the system rolls it back.

Plus, StellarSites includes Solid Security Pro, which uses Patchstack. That means you get virtual patching, even before a plugin update is released, so your site stays protected.

It’s pretty sophisticated stuff. Really great question, and I’m glad you asked.

Speaker 1 (Kyleigh):
Awesome. And I just want to give a shout out to Tom. Tom, thanks for being a big user of StellarSites. He said he has several sites now and they are great. So appreciate that, Tom!

Nice to have a bit of confidence and feedback from someone actually using it.

Thank you everybody. This has been great. We have our socials up there for you to reach out if you have any questions.

We’ll comb through the chat and do a write-up afterward. But otherwise, we will cut this off now and say and bid adieu.

Thank you, guys. Have a great day!