A judge has granted WP Engine’s request for a preliminary injunction against Automattic and Matt Mullenweg in a significant ruling for the WordPress ecosystem, issued on December 11, 2024. The court order requires the defendants to restore conditions to their September 20, 2024 state within 72 hours.
The ruling addresses multiple aspects of the dispute, with the judge finding that WP Engine would suffer irreparable harm without the injunction. The court ordered several specific actions, including the restoration of WP Engine’s access to WordPress.org, the return of control over the Advanced Custom Fields (ACF) plugin directory listing, and the removal of WP Engine customer lists from the wordpressenginetracker.com website.
In response to the ruling, Automattic issued a statement to Search Engine Journal: “Today’s ruling is a preliminary order designed to maintain the status quo. It was made without the benefit of discovery, our motion to dismiss, or the counterclaims we will be filing against WP Engine shortly. We look forward to prevailing at trial as we continue to protect the open source ecosystem during full-fact discovery and a full review of the merits.”
WP Engine expressed satisfaction with the outcome, stating: “We are grateful that the court has granted our motion for a preliminary injunction. The order will bring back much-needed stability to the WordPress ecosystem. WP Engine is focused on serving our partners and customers and working with the community to find ways to ensure a vigorous, and thriving WordPress community.”
The court’s analysis covered six key areas, including success on merits, irreparable harm, balance of equities, public interest, bond requirements, and scope of injunction. In addressing the public interest aspect, the judge noted that “over two million websites run the ACF plugin Mullenweg allegedly tampered with” and emphasized the broader implications for the WordPress ecosystem, which powers more than 40% of all websites.
The order also requires the removal of a checkbox added on October 8, 2024, at login.wordpress.org that required users to confirm they were “not affiliated with WP Engine in any way, financially or otherwise.” Additionally, the defendants must disable any “technological blocking” implemented around September 25, 2024.
The court declined to require WP Engine to post a bond, rejecting the defendants’ request for a $1.6 million security. The injunction takes immediate effect and will remain in place until the court issues a final judgment following the trial.
