Finally! Magento 2.4 (for Open Source and Commerce) has been released with general availability. Additionally, Security-Only Patch 2.3.5-p2 has been released for Magento 2.3.

Curious as to how this Magento 2.4 update will help grow your business by boosting sales and increasing your online presence?

We have compiled a list of functionalities that are enhanced within the Magento 2.4 update as well as what improvements have been made to the platform, read more for full details:

Gist of Magento 2.4 Release

Magento 2.4 includes essential updates aimed at improving security and performance. With this update, Magento emphasizes the need to upgrade your stores as soon as possible to ensure continued security, compliancy, as well as full optimization of the platform.

eCommerce being an ever-evolving market, merchants need to continually adapt in an effort to meet consumer shopping behaviors and market trends. Magento remains committed to merchants, enabling adaptation and growth through frequent version upgrades and timely security patch releases and updates to grow their businesses.

In short, Magento 2.4 delivers significant feature upgrades allowing merchants to advance their online store capabilities:

  • Streamline B2B purchasing with purchase approval workflows
  • Deliver exceptional customer service with Seller Assisted Shopping
  • Generate growth and bring value back to physical locations with In-Store Pickup
  • Save time and resources on your creative workflow with a new Media Gallery
  • Build headless and PWA storefronts faster and more reliably
  • Support higher traffic volumes and deliver outstanding performance with substantial platform upgrades.

Now let’s dive deeper into the enhancements included Magento Open Source and Commerce with its 2.4 updates.

Magento 2.4 Release | Security Enhancements

One of the most vital security enhancements introduced in this update is 2FA.
Magento has introduced the 2FA (Two-Factor Authentication) for the Magento admin panel. This optional security layer is effective in protecting your Magento.com account from unauthorized users who might want to use your account in ways you do not wish to.

Other significant security updates include:

  • Template filter strict mode is now enabled (by default) to prevent RCE (remote code execution) attacks
  • Data rendering for UI data providers is now disabled (by default) to reduce malicious user interference
  • Improvements in content security policy
  • Support for new security.txt file for reporting potential security issues to sire administrators

Magento 2.4 Release | Platform Upgrades

With its 2.4 release, Magento has upgraded the platforms it will support to enhance the level of website security and performance. Here are a few notable platform enhancements:

  • Magento wild now also extend support for:
    • MySQL 8.0
    • Elasticsearch 7.x
    • PHP 7.4
    • PHPUnit 9.x
  • The Zend Framework migrates to the Linux foundation’s Laminas project
  • Removal if the MySQL catalog search engine; replaced by Elasticsearch
  • Further, PHP 7.4 – 7.1, 7.2, along with PHP Unit 9.x-6.5, has been deprecated
  • Additionally, the Brain Tree module and Signifyd fraud protection code has been removed

Magento 2.4 Release | Infrastructure Improvements

With 2.4 updates, Magento improved the overall quality of the Framework including these modules;

  • Customer Account
  • Catalog
  • CMS Import
  • Cart and Checkout
  • B2B

Here’s a quick overview of Infrastructure improvements introduced in Magento 2 Release:

  • Elasticsearch (new default search engine) will now support partial word search
  • Removal of core integration with third-party payment methods such as Authorize.net, Worldpay, and others
  • Migration of PayPal Express Checkout to the latest PayPal Javascript SDK
  • Composer Plugin Update, and more

Magento 2.4 Release | Other Significant Improvements

Although Magento shared numerous other updates, here are a few others that might aid in thriving your business online with Magento Open Source and Commerce:

  • Improvement of up to 25-30% to Quick Order add-to-cart performance
  • Ability to license stock image previews 30X faster from the Media Gallery
  • Enabling the user to add all items from the previous cart to a new one
  • Faster payments with existing data stored in the users’ browser
  • Support to PWA studio 6.0.0 and 6.0.1

You can learn more here: 2.4 Release Information

Wrapping it up

  • The above brief on Magento 2.4 release suggests it is a significant upgrade for online merchants and vendors.
  • With the releases of Magento 2.4, it has been indicated Magento will be releasing version 2.4.x in the near future.
  • The tentative date for 2.4.1 release is currently October 15th, 2020, while 2.4.2 will be released on February 9th, 2021.
  • Just like Magento 2.4, future updates are crucial for ongoing improvement and advancement of the platform.