What happened to WordPress?
The whole ecosystem—themes, plugins, and even the support culture—has turned into a marketplace. Everywhere you go, there’s an upsell. Basic features sit behind paywalls. And if you just want to build a straightforward blog, the experience is frustrating.
Finding a minimalist theme with a clean two-column layout, no widget blocks, no theme blocks, no Gutenberg clutter, and no upgrade prompts used to be easy. Now it feels like searching for something that shouldn’t be rare. Most themes are bloated with builders, bundled features, and aggressive pro-version hooks.
The open-source spirit that made WordPress welcoming has given way to commercial noise. WordPress is still free at its core, but the culture around it has shifted. For someone who simply wants a clean, honest blogging theme, it’s hard not to feel like WordPress has lost its soul.