The other day a client came to us, excited about AI. “Ahmad,” he said, “we need to integrate some of that new AI into our WordPress site. You know, the latest and greatest.” I get it, everyone wants the edge. But after enough years of this work, “latest and greatest” often means “unstable and a debugging nightmare down the road,” especially with something as foundational as the WordPress AI Abilities API.
My first instinct was to grab a beta library, pull in a Composer package, and make it work. We have done that with new REST API endpoints before they fully landed in core, and yeah, it could work for a quick demo. But on a production site, where stability and maintainability matter most, that road is dangerous. You end up with one-off solutions that break on every core update and cost you time and money to fix.
Where the WordPress AI Abilities API is heading
The better approach, and what my team pushes for, is to follow the core initiative. WordPress is working on AI capabilities, and they are being careful about it. Look at the Core AI team’s bi-weekly meeting summary from September 18th, 2025, over on make.wordpress.org/ai. It tells you a lot about where they are going.
They are working through real architectural decisions for WordPress 6.9, like changing the Abilities API’s package type from a library to a wordpress-plugin. Before you panic about “another plugin dependency,” the main point from the discussion (you can read the full summary at this link) is that the change doesn’t impact existing plugins. It is about how the API moves into core as a stable, built-in feature rather than a standalone plugin you install. That is a good sign they are planning for the long term.
They are also spelling out what they expect from a Composer package here. If you have used Composer in a WordPress project, you know it can be a blessing or a curse. But look at how WooCommerce handles it: they pull a pre-6.9 version in via Composer into their vendor directory, which is a practical route for early adopters. The point is that developers can use these tools now, without waiting for the next major WordPress release.
- Client-side abilities: The push for client-side AI abilities in 6.9 is the exciting part. Picture AI help right inside the editor, working as you type.
- Minimal “sparkly” abilities: They want a few genuinely useful abilities in 6.9, not a full suite. That measured start, much like the way the REST API began, tends to produce features that hold up and grow over time.
- “Discover abilities” as a first step: Beginning with a way to discover which AI abilities are available, similar to ChatGPT’s connector specification, is a smart move. It sets up the extensibility that comes later.
So what does this mean for us and for our clients? It means we do not hack together an AI solution and hope for the best. We build with the core in mind, so that when the Abilities API arrives, our work fits a stable, extensible framework instead of turning into a bolted-on mess.
Say you are building a custom AI feature for a client. If you know the core Abilities API is coming, you design your feature to plug into it rather than as a separate silo. You might check whether a given ability is supported before you try to use it:
<?php
/**
* Plugin Name: Bbbioon AI Features
* Description: Custom AI features leveraging WordPress Core AI Abilities.
* Version: 1.0.0
* Author: Bbbioon Team
* Text Domain: bbioon-ai
*/
function bbioon_check_ai_ability() {
// This is a conceptual example. Actual API interaction will vary.
if ( class_exists( 'WP_Core_AI_Abilities' ) && method_exists( 'WP_Core_AI_Abilities', 'has_ability' ) ) {
if ( WP_Core_AI_Abilities::has_ability( 'bbioon_content_generation' ) ) {
// Ability exists, proceed with content generation feature.
bbioon_generate_content_with_ai();
} else {
// Ability not found or not enabled.
bbioon_fallback_content_generation();
}
} else {
// Core AI Abilities API not yet available in this WordPress version.
error_log( 'Bbion AI: Core AI Abilities API not detected.' );
}
}
add_action( 'init', 'bbioon_check_ai_ability' );
function bbioon_generate_content_with_ai() {
// Logic to use the core AI ability.
// ...
}
function bbioon_fallback_content_generation() {
// Fallback logic if AI ability is not available.
// ...
}
?>What this means in practice
WordPress is moving forward with AI, and it is doing so in a measured, iterative way meant to last. Our job as developers is not just to ship the shiny new thing, it is to ship it correctly. That means keeping up with core developments, paying attention to the architectural decisions, and building on these stable foundations. Skip that and you are just piling up tech debt.
This stuff gets complicated fast. If you are tired of debugging someone else’s mess and just want your site to work, drop my team a line. We have probably run into it before.
