docs/releases/6.3.md
November 1, 2024
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Wagtail 6.3 is designated a Long Term Support (LTS) release. Long Term Support releases will continue to receive maintenance updates as necessary to address security and data-loss related issues, up until the next LTS release (typically a period of 12 months).
This release adds formal support for Python 3.13.
This release adds formal support for Django 5.1.
ImageBlock with alt text supportThis release introduces a new block type ImageBlock, which improves upon ImageChooserBlock by allowing editors to specify alt text tailored to the context in which the image is used. This is the new recommended block type for all images that are not purely decorative, and existing instances of ImageChooserBlock can be directly replaced with ImageBlock (with no data migration or template changes required) to benefit from contextual alt text. This feature was developed by Chiemezuo Akujobi as part of the Google Summer of Code program with mentoring support from Storm Heg, Saptak Sengupta, Thibaud Colas and Matt Westcott.
The Wagtail dashboard design evolves towards providing more information and navigation features. Mobile support is much improved. Upgrade banners are now dismissible.
This feature was developed by Albina Starykova and Sage Abdullah, based on designs by Ben Enright.
CMS users can now control the level of contrast of UI elements in the admin interface. This new customization is designed for partially sighted users, complementing existing support for a dark theme and Windows Contrast Themes. The new "More contrast" theming can be enabled in account preferences, or will otherwise be derived from operating system preferences.
This feature was designed thanks to feedback from our blind and partially sighted users, and was developed by Albina Starykova based on design input from Victoria Ottah.
This release follows through with "universal listings" user experience and design consistency improvements earlier in 2024, with the following features.
These features were developed by Sage Abdullah.
The WAGTAILIMAGES_EXTENSIONS setting now accepts the heic extension, which allows users to upload and use HEIC / HEIF images in Wagtail. These images are automatically converted to JPEG format when rendered. For more details, see .
This feature was developed by Matt Westcott.
You can now customize the preview device sizes available in the live preview panel by overriding {attr}~wagtail.models.PreviewableMixin.preview_sizes. The default size can also be set by overriding {attr}~wagtail.models.PreviewableMixin.default_preview_size.
This feature was developed by Bart Cieliński, alexkiro, and Sage Abdullah.
getTextLabel method on date / time StreamField blocks (Vaughn Dickson)WAGTAIL_AUTO_UPDATE_PREVIEW setting, use WAGTAIL_AUTO_UPDATE_PREVIEW_INTERVAL = 0 instead (Sage Abdullah)capfirst for title-casing model verbose names (Sébastien Corbin)copy_for_translation_done signal when copying translatable models as well as pages (Coen van der Kamp)description field across all images, to better support accessible image descriptions (Chiemezuo Akujobi)StaticBlock now renders nothing by default when no template is specified (Sævar Öfjörð Magnússon)file_size field on document model to avoid artificial 2Gb limit (Gabriel Getzie)TypedTableBlock uses the correct API representations of child blocks (Matt Westcott)media definitions (Sage Abdullah)AbstractGroupApprovalTask to ensure can_handle checks for the abstract class correctly (Sumana Sree Angajala)fly.io deployment from the tutorial to this section (Vince Salvino)WAGTAIL_WORKFLOW_REQUIRE_REAPPROVAL_ON_EDIT documentation to state that it defaults to False (Matt Westcott)TokenAuthentication in the Wagtail API v2 Configuration Guide (Krzysztof Jeziorny)pytz dependency in favour of zoneinfo.available_timezones (Sage Abdullah)django-taggit dependency to allow 6.0 (Matt Westcott)SECRET_KEY in version and icon hashes (Jake Howard)get_prep_value for closer alignment with JSONField (Sage Abdullah)IndexView to BaseListingView (Sage Abdullah).in_bulk() on specific querysets under Django 5.2a0 (Sage Abdullah)test-media to .gitignore (Shlomo Markowitz)debounce util's return type for better TypeScript usage (Sage Abdullah)wagtailConfig values from inline scripts to the wagtail_config template tag (LB (Ben) Johnston, Sage Abdullah){% locales %} and {% js_translation_strings %} template tags (LB (Ben) Johnston, Sage Abdullah)beforeunload usage in UnsavedController to trigger a leave page warning when edits have been made (Shubham Mukati, Sage Abdullah)window.wagtailConfig.BULK_ACTION_ITEM_TYPE usage in JavaScript to reduce reliance on inline scripts (LB (Ben) Johnston)window.fileupload_opts usage in JavaScript, use data attributes on fields instead to reduce reliance on inline scripts (LB (Ben) Johnston)image_format_name_to_content_type helper function that duplicates Willow functionality (Matt Westcott)DeleteMenuItem API for footer actions (Sage Abdullah)Python 3.8 is no longer supported as of this release; please upgrade to Python 3.9 or above before upgrading Wagtail.
WAGTAIL_AUTO_UPDATE_PREVIEW settingThe WAGTAIL_AUTO_UPDATE_PREVIEW setting has been deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
To disable the automatic preview update feature, set WAGTAIL_AUTO_UPDATE_PREVIEW_INTERVAL = 0 in your Django settings instead.
window.wagtailConfig.BULK_ACTION_ITEM_TYPEAs part of migrating away from inline scripts, the undocumented use of window.wagtailConfig.BULK_ACTION_ITEM_TYPE as a global has been deprecated and will be removed in a future release.
Old
{% block extra_js %}
{{ block.super }}
<script>
window.wagtailConfig.BULK_ACTION_ITEM_TYPE = 'SOME_ITEM';
</script>
{% endblock %}
New
Update usage of the wagtailadmin/bulk_actions/footer.html template include to declare the item_type.
{% block bulk_actions %}
{% include 'wagtailadmin/bulk_actions/footer.html' ... item_type="SOME_ITEM" %}
{% endblock %}
Custom item types for bulk actions are not officially supported yet and this approach is likely to get further changes in the future.
{% locales %} template tagThe undocumented locales template tag will be removed in a future release.
If access to JSON locales within JavaScript is needed, use window.wagtailConfig.LOCALES instead.
{% js_translation_strings %} template tagThe undocumented js_translation_strings template tag will be removed in a future release.
If access to JSON translation strings within JavaScript is needed, use window.wagtailConfig.STRINGS instead.
UpgradeNotificationPanel is no longer removable with construct_homepage_panels hookThe upgrade notification panel can still be removed with the WAGTAIL_ENABLE_UPDATE_CHECK = False setting.
SiteSummaryPanel is no longer removable with construct_homepage_panels hookThe summary items can still be removed with the construct_homepage_summary_items hook.
DeleteMenuItemThe undocumented DeleteMenuItem API will be removed in a future release.
The delete option is now provided via EditView.get_header_more_buttons(), though this is still an internal-only API.