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WP Packages Changelog Action with Stable Version Warnings

Ben Word Ben Word

We’ve released a new GitHub Action that brings transparency to your WordPress plugin updates in Composer-based projects.

What it does

The WP Packages Changelog Action automatically comments on pull requests whenever your WordPress plugin dependencies change. It fetches changelogs directly from the WordPress.org API and displays them in an organized, collapsible format right in your PR.

The stable tag warning feature

One challenge with plugins is that they sometimes serves newer plugin versions than what’s marked as “stable” in the WordPress.org repository. This can lead to accidentally installing unstable releases in production.

Our action now compares the version being installed against the plugin’s official stable tag. If there’s a mismatch, you’ll see a clear warning:

Screenshot of the wp-composer-changelog-action commenting on a PR

This helps teams catch potential stability issues before they reach production.

How to use it

Create a new workflow file (.github/workflows/wp-packages-changelog.yml):

name: WP Packages Changelog

on:
  pull_request:
    paths:
      - 'composer.lock'
      - 'composer.json'

jobs:
  changelog:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    permissions:
      pull-requests: write
    steps:
      - name: Comment changelogs on PR
        uses: roots/wp-packages-changelog-action@v3

The action will now monitor your PRs and comment whenever WP Packages plugins change.

Why we built this

Working with WordPress plugins via Composer is powerful, but finding the release notes for new versions takes a little effort. You don’t always know what changed between versions or whether you’re installing a stable release. This action brings that visibility directly into your PRs.

Get started

The action is available now on the GitHub Marketplace. Take a look at the roots/wp-composer-changelog-action repo.

Discuss this post on Roots Discourse

About the author

Ben Word

Ben Word has been creating WordPress sites since 2004. He loves dogs, climbing, and yoga, and is passionate about helping people build awesome things on the web.

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