Let’s be honest. Not all WordPress users really love using Gutenberg to write content. 10+ million active installations of the Classic Editor plugin is more than enough to prove it. But is there a way to bring back Classic Editor without a plugin? That’s what I will cover in this post.
Gutenberg itself is a great editor. It offers a more modern interface with more elements you can add to your content, beyond text and image.
I personally prefer Gutenberg over Classic Editor and suggest those who still use Classic Editor to switch to it too. It is the future of WordPress. Gutenberg is not just a content editor. It is a versatile editor usable to edit the content and design of your website.
But again. Not every WordPress user really loves it. Some prefer Classic Editor, which is fine because WordPress is a diverse community.
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Classic Editor vs Gutenberg
While Gutenberg offers a more modern content editing experience, not all WordPress users really welcome it warmly. Especially old users who have been using WordPress before the Gutenberg era.
To them, Classic Editor is still the best editor to write content. This argument is not completely wrong to be honest.
Sometimes, I wish I could have my old writing experience back (with Classic Editor). But with a cleaner interface. Like Gutenberg in the fullscreen mode.
Classic Editor is great for those who use WordPress solely for blogging because you don’t have to deal with too many, unnecessary setting options. You can focus on your content without needing to think about which setting options you should use.
After all, you can use a theme builder like Elementor Pro or Divi to arrange the layout and the entire design of your content on the front-end.
Or you can also use the design options available on the theme you use.
Gutenberg, on the other hand, is a better solution if you prefer using a single editor to write content, to create pages, and to edit other parts of your website (header, footer, etc.).
Bringing Back WordPress Classic Editor without Involving a Plugin
The easiest way to bring back Classic Editor is by installing the Classic Editor plugin. It is the plugin developed and maintained by the WordPress development team to facilitate those who still want to use Classic Editor.
But if you prefer the no-plugin solution to bring Classic Editor back, then you can use one of the following options:
Using the Built-in Setting Option of Your Theme
Some WordPress theme developers are aware that not all WordPress users love Gutenberg and they offer a built-in setting option to bring back Classic Editor with a single click.
Divi and Avada are two examples of popular WordPress themes that come with this setting option. The two also come with a theme builder feature which you can use to customize the layout (and the entire design) of your blog post layout.
For the purpose of this tutorial, I will show you how to bring back Classic Editor in Divi.
Bringing Back Classic Editor in Divi
The very first thing you need to do before you can use Divi to enable Classic Editor is to have the Divi theme installed and activated on your WordPress website.
Divi itself is a paid theme from Elegant Themes. You can get it on its official website. If you experience an installation issue, I have published a dedicated post about how to install Divi that you can read to fix the issue.
Once you have installed and activated Divi, go to Divi -> Theme Options on your WordPress dashboard.
On the Divi Theme Options screen, go to Builder -> Advanced tab and you should see a setting option labelled Enable Classic Editor. Simply toggle the switch and click the Save Change button.
You should now have your Classic Editor back.
Using Custom Code
What if you don’t use Divi or Avada and still want to bring Classic Editor back without installing a plugin?
Although WordPress has transitioned from Classic Editor to Gutenberg, the development team didn’t really remove Classic Editor.
Classic Editor is still around in the WordPress core. It is just not enabled by default. You can enable Classic Editor yourself using a single line of code below:
add_filter('use_block_editor_for_post', '__return_false', 10);The above code doesn’t remove Gutenberg from your WordPress installation. Instead, it only replaces the default editor from Gutenberg to Classic Editor.
In other words, any WordPress plugins and features that rely on Gutenberg will not be interrupted. You can still use them normally.
How to Add the Code?
There are two options to add the above code. First, you can edit the functions.php file of your active theme. This is the easiest way, but not the most effective one.
Why?
Because every time you update your theme to the newest version, you may need to re-add the code.
If you prefer to add the code using this method, first, go to Appearance -> Theme File Editor on your WordPress editor.
If you can’t find the menu item, try to check the settings of your security plugin because some security plugins disable it on the default configuration.
⚠️ If you are a block theme user, you can find Theme File Editor under the Tools menu.
On the Theme File Editor screen, select the functions.php file on the right panel to edit it. Paste the code snippet right after the last line of the file content and hit the Update File button.
And boom. You should now get your Classic Editor back.
But again. The above method is not effective enough because you need to re-add the code after you update your theme to the newest version.
So, instead of editing the functions.php file, you can create a custom plugin dedicated to hosting all custom functions on your WordPress site.
Here are the detailed instructions if you want to learn more about the method.
Summary
WordPress has two editors that you can use to edit content: Classic Editor and Gutenberg (block editor). By default, Gutenberg is the editor that is activated on every WordPress installation since version 5.0.
While Gutenberg offers a more modern editor with more elements you can add and more advanced design capability, not every WordPress user really loves it and prefers using the Classic Editor for content writing.
The WordPress development team offers an official Classic Editor plugin you can install to bring back Classic Editor.
But if you prefer the no-plugin way to bring back Classic Editor, then you can use either the built-in setting option offered by your theme (if available) or use the code I provided above.
