How to Disable Gutenberg and Keep the Classic Editor in WordPress

The WordPress has released its new update and jumped from version 4.9.8 to 5.0.1 and named it “Bebo”. In this WordPress new update, they have made the biggest change by introducing a new Editor called Gutenberg from which they have tired it to make it a modern type editor which acts like a page builder plugin that allows the user to simply drag and drop items into a post or page. But after the upgrade, a lot of users are experiencing difficulties in using it, and want the old Classic editor back.
The changes in the Gutenberg editor mean you have to learn a whole new set of features introduced in this update. If you don’t have time learning the new Gutenberg Editor then you might want to head back to the Classic Editor to resume your work because after updating to 5.0.1 you will not be able to use the Classic Editor. So, in this article, I will walk you through the steps to bypass the new Gutenberg Editor to use the Classic one. In order to do that below are the easiest methods that will allow you to disable Gutenberg to keep classic editor in WordPress.
Before we start with the step-wise guide, I will presume that you have already updated to WordPress 5.0 “Bebo”. So let’s start with the step-wise guide.

Method 1: Add Classic Editor Plugin

Once you’re logged in WordPress and you’re on your Dashboard, from the navigation pane hover your mouse pointer on the Plugins option as highlighted above.

From the Plugin menu, click on the Add New option as highlighted above.

From the Add Plugins search bar, type in “Classic Editor” and hit Enter. After WordPress process the search you can see the Classic Editor Plugin on the top published by WordPress Contributors as highlighted above.

Now simply click on the Install Now button in order to download and install the Classic Editor plugin as shown above.

After installation is complete you can see that the Install Now button has changed into an Activate button as highlighted above. Simply click the Activate button to use the Classic Editor Plugin as shown above.

Now from the Classic Editor’s Writing Settings, make sure you have selected Classic Editor option of “Default Editor for all users” as highlighted above. You can also “Allow users to switch editors”, this option will provide you an option to switch Editor between Classic to Block when creating post and pages (But it is not recommended for now).

After you’re done selecting the recommended options, click on Save Changes button as shown above to apply Changes.
Now go check your Editor will be changed into Classic Editor. Whenever you want the Gutenberg Editor back you can always deactivate the Classic Editor from its Plugin settings.

Method 2: Disable Gutenberg Completely Without Plugin

From the WordPress Navigation pane, hover your mouse on the Appearance option and select Themes from the menu as highlighted above.

Now select the Child Theme and Activate it. After activating click on the Editor option from the Navigation pane as shown above.

From the Editor click on the Theme Functions option located under the Theme Files navigation pane as highlighted above.

Now scroll all the way down in the PHP code and add this command line listed below to disable the Gutenberg Editor completely:
• add_filter(‘use_block_editor_for_post’, ‘__return_false’);

After adding the above line in the theme function click on the Update File button to apply changes to the code. Now you can check that you will be only allowed to use Classic Editor, no plugin required for this process.
That’s it hope this article helped you on disabling Gutenberg and keep the Classic Editor in WordPress 5.0. If you had any confusion or difficulty in following the instructions of the process, please let us know in the comments section below.