Here’s what’s new in the latest Newspack release.
Newsletters admin redesign (#2163, #4735)
The first milestone of our newsletter modernization effort ships in this release: the entire Newsletters admin has been rebuilt to match the modern WordPress editing experience, making it faster and more consistent with the rest of WordPress.
What’s new
- Newsletters list — a modern table with author avatars, status badges, visibility for auto-drafts, and filters for Author, Categories, Tags, and Send-List.
- Quick Edit — now opens in a tidy side panel instead of the old inline editor.
- Newsletter Ads & Advertisers — both redesigned; the new Advertisers screen replaces the old taxonomy admin and adds parent/child grouping and ad counts.
- Layouts — a new Layouts screen with visual previews, an authoring editor, and an “Add new newsletter” picker so you can start from a layout.
- Settings — rebuilt as a single streamlined screen with a grid of ESP brand cards (ActiveCampaign, Mailchimp, Constant Contact, Manual/Other), inline credentials, one-click Authorize for Constant Contact, unsaved-changes protection, and a save confirmation. Ad tracking and Letterhead are now sections within Settings, so the separate Tracking tab is gone.
- Subscription Lists — per-row toggles with Local/ESP badges that save immediately; the section is hidden when using the Manual/Other provider.
- Merge-tag picker — a toolbar button on text blocks plus a
{}autocomplete trigger that fetches available tags live from your ESP (now supporting ActiveCampaign alongside Mailchimp). - Friendlier empty states across newsletters, ads, and advertisers.
Self-service management for Group Subscriptions in My Account (#148)
For sites using the new Access Control system: Group owners can now manage their members and invitations directly from My Account, without needing publisher support. A new /my-account/group/ area lets owners view their group, invite members by email or invite link, resend or cancel pending invites, remove members, and switch between multiple groups when they own more than one subscription.
Members get a clearer experience too: they can see the subscription they belong to and the owner’s display name (without exposing the owner’s email address), and leave the group from the subscription page. Empty Orders and Payment information sections are hidden for members who don’t have their own.
Publishers can customize the reader-facing “group” terminology under Audience > Configuration > Advanced settings — for example, relabeling groups as “Teams” or “Memberships.” The URL stays /group/, but the visible labels, buttons, and notices use your chosen terms.
Private Tags: final fixes for RSS feeds and public visibility (#189)
Private Tags lets editors mark a tag as “private” so it’s hidden from readers while still working normally behind the scenes. This release closes the last few places where a private tag name could still appear publicly.
- Partner RSS editor — private tags now show a “(private)” label when choosing tags for a Custom/Partner RSS feed, so it’s clear which tags are hidden from readers.
- RSS feeds — private tags no longer appear in feed tag lists, including main site, category, author, and Custom/Partner feeds.
- New setting — “Remove private tags from RSS feeds” under Settings → Advanced Settings turns this behavior on or off.
- Reader data — private tags are stripped from the data sent to the browser, so they can’t be uncovered by viewing the page source. This is always on.
Other changes
- [FEAT] replaced Audience Management auto-enable with an explicit platform chooser (Newspack / RevEngine / Other) and a manual on/off toggle. (#196)
- [FEAT] readers arriving from a newsletter email link (
utm_medium=email) are treated as newsletter subscribers for prompt/campaign segmentation for the rest of their browsing session. (#312) - [FIX] addressed a Block Editor Colors preview issue on WordPress 7.0 with a temporary patch to the Newspack Theme. (#198)
- [FIX] moved some ads-related styles from the Newspack Theme into Newspack Ads. (#233)
- [FIX] content rules targeting a parent category now also gate posts in child categories, matching WooCommerce Memberships behavior. (#283)
- [FIX] restored default separator widths on WordPress 7.0+. (#324)
- [FIX]
variation_idin modal checkout links now opens the correct product variation. (#163) - [FIX] Remove Author Profile Social Link colour label changes to avoid bleeding into other blocks (#4703)
- [FIX] Correct submit button text on change-payment-method page (#4654)
