Drupal 10 is planned for June 2022

Drupal 8 to 9 was the easiest major Drupal upgrade in a decade! The next version is planned to be a similarly straightforward step. The tools and processes to use to prepare are the same. Most of the upgrade steps involve keeping your Drupal 9 site all up to date with latest Drupal core and contributed projects.

What's in it for me?

Screenshot of the Olivero themeDrupal 10 will be a refined version of Drupal 9 with the following key planned features:

  • Automated security updates for certain use cases.
  • Claro administration theme (replacing Seven).
  • Olivero default theme (replacing Bartik).
  • Further improved Layout Builder and Media functionality.
  • Better decoupled component support, especially for menu and URL handling. 
  • Introduction of CKEditor 5 with better authoring experience and more modern editing (replacing CKEditor 4).
  • Modern JavaScript components to replace jQuery UI and some uses of jQuery.
  • Theme starterkit tools for bespoke theme creation.
  • Symfony 5 or 6 under the hood (replacing Symfony 4) and PHP 8 required to keep the system secure.

How will the upgrade look like?

Check project status

We are tracking the status of contributed projects based on data produced by the Drupal Association, like we did for Drupal 8 to 9. Dries Buytaert explained the high level process towards Drupal 10 in his State of Drupal keynote at DrupalCon Global 2020. Here is the Drupal 10 part:

The best way to prepare for Drupal 10 now

  • Upgrade to Drupal 9 if not already. The tools only support code compatibility checking towards the next major version, so you must be on Drupal 9 for accurate upgrade status information.
  • Install Upgrade status on your development site.
  • Use the Administer >> Reports >> Upgrade Status page to check if there are already deprecated API uses you can fix in your custom code. Use the latest APIs where possible.
  • Keep your contributed projects up to date, but hold off on taking other action on contributed projects for now. The Project Update Bot and other community tools are being prepared for the path to Drupal 10 and will automate a big part of that process.