Dear WP Travel Engine users, we’re pleased to announce the official release of WP Travel Engine v6.0. 

As promised, the wait is over! You can now enjoy the exciting new features and improvements designed to elevate your travel booking website.

Before diving into the details, we want to extend a big thank you to our dedicated users who participated in the WP Travel Engine Beta 6.0 testing phase. Your valuable feedback played a crucial role in shaping V.6.0 and ensuring it meets your needs.

What’s New in WP Travel Engine v6.0

1. Improved Page Speed

We’ve improved the page speed, particularly for single-trip pages, resulting in significantly faster load times. This improvement ensures minimal waiting for your users, making the booking process smoother for your travellers.

Comparison of Load Time:

MetricCurrent VersionVersion 6.0
Finish Time9.58 s8.91 s
DOMContent Loaded Time2.46 s2.36 s
Load Time4.14 s3.11 s

Reduction in Load Time: 24.88%

Comparison of Speed of WP Travel Engine 6.0

2. Lightweight and Efficient

We’ve simplified the plugin’s code and optimised CSS and JS for single trips, making version 6.0 lighter and faster. These improvements will speed up page loads and reduce your server’s resource use.

Comparison of the Number of Requests of CSS and JavaScript:

Number of RequestsCurrent VersionVersion 6.0
CSS54
JS159

Reduction in CSS: 1% | Reduction in JS: 6%

Comparison of optimized code of WP Travel Engine 6.0

Comparison of CSS and JavaScript File Size:

File SizeCurrent VersionVersion 6.0
CSS Size683 kB194 kB
JS Size531 kB391 kB

Reduction in CSS: 71.58% | Reduction in JS: 26.37%

Comparison of optimized code of WP Travel Engine 6.0

3. Booking Modal Improvements

The booking modal, which opens when the user clicks “Check Availability” on an individual trip page, has been developed using ReactJS. 

The modal is now more user-friendly and offers a better user experience by using the available REST API endpoints to fetch data.

[Shown API Requests]

[Booking Modal in action]


Other Enhancements and Fixes

In addition to the major updates, we’ve worked on several minor features and fixes in version 6.0:

1. Implemented Sidebar Panel

We’ve added an “Enable Advance Search Panel” option for the trip archive page. This allows you to toggle the search sidebar even on smaller devices like tablets and phones.

enable toggle sidebar

How to enable the Advanced Search Panel?

  • Navigate to the WP Travel Engine menu in your WordPress dashboard.
  • Click on the Settings tab.
  • Go to the Display settings.
  • Now, go to the Trip Archive section.  
  • Here, toggle the switch to enable or disable the panel.
  • Click the Save button to apply your changes.

2. Gallery Image Control

We’ve introduced an “Enable Image Gallery Autoplay” option on the single trip page. This feature allows you to disable the automatic playback of gallery images. 

How to enable the Image Gallery Autoplay?

  • In your WordPress dashboard, navigate to the WP Travel Engine menu. 
  • Click on the Settings tab. 
  • Now, go to Display and click on the Single Trip tab. 
  • Here, scroll to the Image Gallery Autoplay and enable the toggle. 
  • Finally, click the Save button to apply your changes.

3. Enhanced Partial Payment

Completing remaining trip payments is now easier, with a checkout page showing your cart details (price, due payment) for finalising payments. Previously, you could only pay the due amount without seeing the cart history.

partial payment changes

[Due Payment from my account]

4. Changes to Booking Management

To make changes to an existing booking or create a new one, please use the ‘WP Travel Engine > Booking > Add New’ option.

Due to complexity, we’ve removed the ability to edit or add bookings directly from the booking details page.

booking management changed
These two option has been removed.

Bug Fixes

  • Date Picker Compatibility: Fixed an issue with the date picker, making it compatible with the Form Editor add-on. 
  • Accurate Traveler Information: The date of birth selection issue on the traveller information page has been fixed, ensuring accurate customer data capture.
  • Custom Trip Tabs: Fixed the issue of custom trip tabs being automatically deleted, ensuring a well-organized and informative display of your travel packages.

Deprecated Classes and Their Replacements

If you’re a developer using our WP Travel Engine for your theme or custom website development, here are the details of the code changes we made in version 6.0.

1. Cart

Deprecated Class: WTE_Cart
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Core\Cart\Cart
Notes:

  • Cart calculation is now more accurate.
  • New methods to access cart data, such as get_totals.
  • The remaining due payment is now handled using the cart.

2. Booking Inventory

Deprecated Class: WPTravelEngine\Core\BookingInventory
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Core\Booking\Inventory
Notes:

  • Responsible for updating booking seats for booked trips.
  • Manages trip booking inventory according to date and trip packages.

3. Trip Post Type

Deprecated Class: WPTravelEngine\Posttype\Trip
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Core\Models\Post\Trip
Notes:

  • Functions as a model for the trip post type.
  • New methods to access and update trip data.

4. Trip Booking

Deprecated Class: WPTravelEngine\Core\Trip\Booking
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Core\Models\Post\Booking
Notes:

  • Manages trip booking data.
  • New methods to access and update booking data.

5. Main Plugin File

Deprecated Class: Wp_Travel_Engine
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Plugin
Notes:

  • Deprecated to manage the plugin better and ensure consistency.

6. Plugin Settings

Deprecated Class: WPTravelEngine\Core\Settings
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Core\PluginSettings
Notes:

  • A new class was introduced to manage plugin settings, as the deprecated class was not used anywhere in the plugin.

Future Deprecations

  • More classes and methods will be deprecated in the releases leading up to version 6.0.0.
  • PHP autoload features are being implemented, and all deprecated classes and methods will be removed in version 7.0.0.
  • Autoload classes are located in the includes/classes directory with the namespace WPTravelEngine.

Payment Gateways

New Base Class: WPTravelEngine\PaymentGateways\BaseGateway
Notes:

  • Handles all payment gateway-related functionalities.
  • Developers can extend this class to create their own payment gateways.
  • The existing hook wp_travel_engine_available_payment_gateways is deprecated.
  • Use the new hook wptravelengine_registering_payment_gateways to register payment gateways.

Booking Process

Deprecated Class: WPTravelEngine\Core\Booking
Replacement: WPTravelEngine\Core\Booking\BookingProcess
Notes:

  • Manages the booking process after submitting the checkout form.
  • Responsible for creating bookings, processing payments, and sending email notifications.
  • Handles due payment requests.

New REST API Endpoints

We have introduced new REST API endpoints for the post-type trip. Currently, only GET methods are available, with more methods to be added in future releases.

  • GET: /wp-json/wp-travel-engine/v2/trips
    • Provides a list of trips with their data.
  • GET: /wp-json/wp-travel-engine/v2/trips/{id}
    • Provides data for a single trip with the given ID.
  • GET: /wp-json/wp-travel-engine/v2/trips/{id}/dates
    • Provides all trip dates available with the respective packages for the given trip ID.
  • GET: /wp-json/wp-travel-engine/v2/trips/{id}/packages
    • Provides all trip packages available for the given trip ID.

Recap of Key Features from WP Travel Engine v5.0 to v6.0

Have you explored the exciting features added in WP Travel Engine since version 5.0? If not, let’s dive in and discover how WP Travel Engine has evolved: 

1. Analytics Dashboard 

2. New Add-on: Per Trip Emails

3. Addition of new widgets in WP Travel Engine – Elementor Widgets

4. New Add-on: Email Customizer 

6. Automatically Generate User Account

7. Rank Math Compatibility

8. Accurate Down Payment Calculations and Improved Code Structure

9. Gutenberg Blocks for Trip Page Creation

10. Pattern Engine for WP Travel Engine users


Conclusion

We encourage you to upgrade to V.6.0 and enjoy the new features and improvements.

You can upgrade from your dashboard or download it from https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-travel-engine/. For safety, we strongly recommend backing up your site before updating to V.6.0.

To that end, we invite you to share your suggestions and feedback with us. If you have any questions, please share your thoughts below. For a more interactive discussion, you can also join our Facebook Community.

Thank you for choosing WP Travel Engine! We’re always working to make WP Travel Engine the best travel booking solution for you.