Easy Digital Downloads 3.0 Now in Public Beta

Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is coming up on a major milestone with version 3.0 in active development, a huge undertaking spanning nearly three years. The first beta was released today with one of the most extensive and technically detailed beta testing guides I’ve seen for a major plugin update.

Version 3.0 will migrate the bulk of EDD data out of WordPress core tables to custom database tables. During the lifespan of this nearly 10-year old plugin, practices have changed regarding the use of custom tables and the coming update will bring improvements to performance and data structures. Testers can download it from GitHub and go through the data migration process. The beta testing guide specifies a list of seven tables to check after migration to ensure there are no issues with data transfer or backwards compatibility.

The release post noted that the order refund functionality is still in development and will not yet be ready for testing until the beta 2 release.

EDD first came on the scene in 2012. Inspired by Jigoshop and WooCommerce’s successes with the “extensions marketplace” business model, EDD creator Pippin Williamson has prioritized extensibility from the beginning. There are now more than 102 official extensions and themes, and hundreds more third-party extensions. Anytime EDD core moves forward with major changes, the wide community of extensions is a critical consideration.

For this reason, EDD is pursuing a strategy of releasing a series of updates to as many extensions as possible that contain compatibility with 3.0. The announcement lists eight extensions, including Stripe Gateway, Software Licensing, PDF Invoices, Commissions, and others which have been updated and can be used in testing.

EDD is also encouraging third-party developers to check out the 3.0 code base and ensure compatibility ahead of the official release. WordPress freelancers and agencies who have clients using EDD will want to test out the 3.0 beta 1 ahead of time to find any concerns with data migration that would prevent their clients from having a smooth transition when the official release drops.