Developer Network™ Joomla! Feature Roadmap
Based on the needs and requirements in the foreseen future of Joomla the following roadmap was created. Please remember: as an open source project, Joomla’s direction is defined by its volunteers and available resources, therefore all dates are tentative and the proposed focus for each release is subject to modification.
Joomla! 6.x
These features have the highest priority to set the ground line for upcoming features. If you would like to volunteer, please get in touch with the contact person of the feature you're interested in.
Defend and Expand Market Lead
Implement built-in POW captcha
- Person in Charge:
- David Jardin
- Status:
- Merged
Description
This feature adds a new captcha to the Joomla core. It's based on the concept of "proof of work": it presents a math task to the user's browser that the browser can solve automatically. It's not supposed to proof humanship of the user, but to proof that the user is willing to invest the necessary time to solve the task.
That makes it an excellent fit for Joomla's usecase:
- it does not rely on an external service, does not need an API key and does not have any privacy implications
- it's based on an opensource library
- it does not try to proof humanship - a fight that we can't win anyways
- it's accessible
It's currently based on the altcha library, see https://altcha.org.
Extend Content versioning with draft states and by expanding it to more entities and attributes
- Person in Charge:
- Marco Schubert
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Description
Extension of Joomla!’s content versioning to include draft states as well as additional entities and attributes. This enhancement enables not only articles but also categories, modules, and menu items to be versioned and saved as drafts. Editors can prepare, internally review, and later publish content without modifying or affecting live content. The ability to easily review these states (who did what, when, and how) is crucial for many Joomla users.
Important Scope
- Integrate draft states that are logged within the versioning system.
- Log all changes within versioning (including changes to publish status, approvals, and custom fields).
- Extend the existing versioning functionality rather than replacing it — all actions, including edits, status changes, and approvals, must be recorded in the version history.
- Ensure that edits made in a draft do not update or overwrite the currently published content.
- Extend versioning to include the most entities and attributes (like categories and menus).
WCAG 2.2 AA compliance
- Person in Charge:
- Dimitris Grammatikogiannis, Joomla Accessibility and Usability Team
- Status:
- In Planning
Description
Improve Joomla!’s accessibility compliance from WCAG 2.1 AA to WCAG 2.2 AA for both backend and frontend components.
Increase Efficiency
Massively enhance documentation for machines (webservice documentation)
- Person in Charge:
- Arend-Henk Huzen
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Description
Make the Webservices API accessible to users and machines through comprehensive documentation (in the current documentation environment
Massively enhance documentation for developers (developer documentation)
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Investigate if and how to integrate the AI Framework
- Person in Charge:
- Maarten Blokdijk, Tom van der Laan
- Status:
- In Planning
Description
During GSoC 2025 there was one project that worked on building a AI Framework for Joomla. This framework would allow extensions devs to implement AI in their extensions in a standardised and easy way.
https://github.com/joomla-projects/gsoc25_ai_framework/tree/4.x-dev
The framework provides a clean provider abstraction layer. It covers most of the basic interactions with AI providers. There is also good documentation.
Build MCP servers to enable AI usage - with WCAG in mind
- Person in Charge:
- David Jardin, Stefan Wendhausen
- Status:
- In Progress
Description
The Joomla roadmap identifies usability and efficiency for site owners as a key challenge. MCP offers a promising solution. It is a protocol that allows AI agents to securely read resources and perform actions in external systems.
Applied to Joomla, an MCP server could empower administrators to:
- create categories, articles, and menus automatically from a sitemap or PDF
- generate SEO-optimized titles and meta descriptions in bulk
- apply extension updates across multiple sites
- build landing pages for upcoming product launches
Crucially, the MCP server is not envisioned as a “super admin only” feature. The initiative aims for a solution that is easy to set up, lightweight, and accessible to a broad range of users.
Improve webservices to enable better machine-to-machine communication
- Person in Charge:
- Martin Kopp
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Description
Collecting documentation on the current web services API and checking it for accuracy and completeness
Massively enhance documentation for end users (user manual)
- Person in Charge:
- Herman Peeren
- Status:
- In Progress
Simplify Onboarding
UI/UX: Intelligent module assignment
- Person in Charge:
- Tom van der Laan, Laura Gordon
- Status:
- In Progress
Description
Inheritance in module assignment. If a module is determined to include inheritance, as sub-menu items are created within a parent menu item, that module will automatically appear on those pages.
Redirects for renamed / removed / unpublished items
- Person in Charge:
- Rachel Walraven
- Status:
- Ready for testing
Description
Show a feedback messages when items, categories or menus are unpublished/renamed to help the user to create reasonable redirects with the Joomla! Redirect extension. Additionally redirects could be created by the system automatically.
UI/UX: Configurable authoring forms
- Person in Charge:
- Robert Deutz
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
New Sample Dataset, demonstrating Joomla’s extensive featureset
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Joomla! 7.x
These are the mid-term features which need probably some more effort or have B/C-breaks which can only be injected into Joomla! at the next major version.
Defend and Expand Market Lead
Rate Limiting Framework
- Person in Charge:
- Harald Leithner
- Status:
- In Planning
Description
Add a generic rate limiting framework to the Joomla core, allowing both core and 3rd party developers to rate limit specific interactions, i.e., preventing brute force attacks to login forms.
Framework-agnostic Templates/Design System
- Person in Charge:
- Harald Leithner
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Description
Main challenge of this feature, is to find a way to implement an CSS framework agnostic layer in Joomla.
Automated Workflows
- Person in Charge:
- Marco Schubert, Benjamin Trenkle
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Increase Efficiency
3rd party dev experience: Standardize horizontal component API
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Simplify Onboarding
New “modern and sexy” default template (target: each major version has a new template)
- Person in Charge:
- Marco Schubert
- Status:
- Looking for Volunteers
Description
Introduction of a new modern, visually appealing, and forward-looking default template for Joomla, with the goal that each major Joomla version ships with a fresh, contemporary design.
Rather than being a complete rewrite, the new default template should be understood as a visual evolution of the existing core template.
The underlying template structure, logic, and core concepts remain largely unchanged, while the visual layer (layout, typography, spacing, colors, UI components) receives a modern refresh — comparable to a make-over or overlay that updates the look and feel without disrupting established functionality.
This approach ensures stability, compatibility, and continuity, while still allowing Joomla to present itself as modern, fresh, and relevant.
The template serves both as a production-ready default and a best-practice reference for designers, developers, and site builders.
Important Scope
- Deliver a new default template for each major Joomla release (e.g. Joomla 8).
- Focus on modern UI/UX design principles (clean layout, strong typography, sensible spacing, subtle motion).
- Ensure full responsiveness and mobile-first design.
- Maintain accessibility (WCAG) and usability standards.
- Use current frontend best practices.
- Provide reasonable customization options without overcomplicating the template.
- Act as a reference implementation for template developers.