Magento 2.4: All about new release notes and highlights

Magento 2.4 is on fire!!!

Besides the pandemic shake, the Magento community has shown its strength by releasing its latest Magento 2.4 version on July 28, 2020. This proves that nothing can set back the Magento community, and it’s still improving with each version release!

Create robust feature-rich custom Magento websites that suit your business today!!!

And here, the Magento 2.4 platform!!!

During every release, Magento comes with features that make the eCommerce platform even more powerful in various aspects. And so Magento 2.4 is no different.

The Magento 2.4.0 release includes 65+ bug fixes, 90+ new features, 50+ security changes, 10+ packages, 6+ test cycles & extensions as well as support for latest PHP version 7.4.

Magento 2.4 Platform Upgrades

Support for PHP 7.4, PHPUnit 9.x
Support for Elasticsearch 7.x and MySQL 8.0
Removed MySQL search engine
Support for MariaDB 10.4
Core Braintree module removed
The Zend Framework has been deprecated and migration to the Laminas project
Removed the support for Signifyd fraud protection code

Here we list out the new features and enhancements that ship with the world’s no.1 eCommerce platform.

What is new in Magento 2.4?

New and improved default search engine
Improved Media Gallery
New feature Seller-Assisted Shopping
New feature Purchase Approval Workflows
Two-factor authentication for improved security
Higher technical requirements overall

Apart from the above-mentioned, you can leverage the following to put things forward:

2FA security for Magento 2 admin panel
Purchase approval workflows
Seller assisted shopping
In-store pickup
New media gallery
PWA Development
Headless eCommerce

Previous Magento 2 releases:

MUCH BETTER SEARCH

Magento 2.4 lands with the default Magento search engine and is no longer powered by MySQL. Here every search action by the customer of the Magento site will be excellent.

To offer such a seamless search experience, Magento requires you to install Elasticsearch on your server before going on with Magento 2.4.

All in all, search improvement in Magento 2.4 is good news. You can provide your customers with an even better search experience if you choose to invest some more.

NEW GALLERY AND TWO-FACTOR AUTHENTICATION

This time the improvements are for the hands of the Admin user to enhance the user experience.

The new Two-factor authentication aid in fixing the prevailing authentication issue, this adds a special layer of security for your Magento Admin account. The procedure is the same as in most services that have 2FA. But here a system code is sent to the user as the additional layer of authentication.

And with the enhanced environment, your store admin can now search, sort, filter, and find the images faster than in previous versions. This completely redeveloped Media Gallery claims that it can perform up to 30x faster than the previous version.

Anywhere on the internet, images sell. So make it easier to work with images to make more efficient conversions and sales process through your eCommerce store.

Additionally, the new Media Gallery is integrated with Adobe Stock in away. It lets you access stock image previews right from the Media Gallery, this feature is worth looking into.

SELLER-ASSISTED SHOPPING FOR BETTER CUSTOMER SERVICE

The last time you needed help from some customer service representative, was he/she can walk you through the entire process of using the service from your perspective?

If yes, that was probably great customer service.

With Magento 2.4’s new feature Seller-Assisted Shopping, your Customer Service Representatives can log into the website as the customer from the Magento Admin.

With this update, the platform put a zero-count (i.e) now they no longer ask for the customer’s password to hand over for countless options.

Now they can guide and assist the customer in all aspects of the buyer’s experience:

Assist the customer to view a feature like a wishlist
Now they can aid the customer to find the most relevant or even the product that they’re searching for.
They can guide the customer through custom functionalities that are the best understandable in the storefront experience (e.g. a product configurator)
They can impress customers and save them time by quickly creating orders and quotes on their behalf
And they can take care of administrative tasks such as adding buyers and setting up approval rules

CLICK-AND-COLLECT/ IN-STORE PICKUP

We strongly recommend this feature solely for your retail partners. Our prediction over this in-store pickup feature has three major benefits, they are:

Improves conversion rates by cutting off the shipping fees from the total.
It sensibly boosts the chance of picking the up-selling products by customers – some induce customers to make extra purchases.
It is believed to be a good example of synergy between an online store and the good brick-and-mortar store.

This feature is now native to Magento 2.4 and ships with both versions of Magento(i.e. Open Source and the Commerce versions). It also enables the store owners to display eligible pickup locations and applicable working hours to reduce business congestion.

When an online order is ready for pickup, the store operator can notify the customer with a single click. There is also a possibility for curbside pickup.

PURCHASE APPROVAL WORKFLOWS(ONLY FOR MAGENTO COMMERCE)

Though it is only applicable for Magento commerce(B2B segment), it has quite similar features that we’ve in the Magento store. This new functionality brings better control over spending by B2B companies. Enabling this feature will set up approval for individual purchases.

For that, they can create approval workflows with specific rules based on order value, number of SKUs, or shipping costs.

For example, if a B2B company wants to make a purchase of over USD 5,000.00 or over 10 SKUs. In this case, it has to be approved by the Purchasing Manager. This can easily be set up automatically with a Purchase Approval Workflow.

There can even be multiple approvers, and each of them is automatically notified when their approval is needed. Approvers can easily approve or reject, as well as comment on a purchase order in their accounts.

It ensures the purchase process transparency just by sending notifications to the buyers at each stage of purchase activity.

GENERAL PLATFORM UPGRADE AND SECURITY IMPROVEMENTS

Other than previously mentioned upgrades of Elasticsearch, Magento 2.4 comes with more platform upgrades that developers should put focus on.

Most importantly, Magento 2.4 lands with support for the latest PHP 7.4 version and the MySQL 8.0 database to enable their improved performance, security, and reliability.

These advanced upgrades themselves show how Magento is working to optimize its platform towards the most advanced technological requirements.

NEW PWA STUDIO IN MAGENTO 2.4

According to the new Magento 2.4 release, the updated PWA Studio makes the store a better performer.

“In simple, it makes faster, easier, and more cost-effective to launch PWA storefronts”.

Also, one can call PWA Studio a sort of toolbox for store build. Now it is been enriched with two more tools and best practices for building PWAs.

With our experience, we say that PWAs may not bring a big break in the revenue to justify the high maintenance costs at this moment. Because still, you need to connect it to the extensions and maintain it for upcoming Magento versions.

So the only step in the right direction is making modifications to the PWA Studio. Soon or even shortly, it will be possible to tell if they translate to more significant revenue growth for PWA merchants.

Magento 2.4 Is A HEADLESS COMMERCE

This is a special mention that this improvement particularly is to support the headless commerce concept, which is potent.

In simple, headless commerce technology is a solution that enables your eCommerce store to provide a custom user experience on all digital channels.

It won’t just stop there, beyond just desktop and mobile, headless commerce will take your eCommerce store to the Internet of Things. Headless is the concept that will take e-commerce to the Internet of Things. This makes your eCommerce more mature for those who’re new and seeking growth opportunities.

CONCLUSION

Why one should consider moving their online store to Magento 2x?

If your online eCommerce store is somewhere mid-version() Magento 1, and it sets you back. Then it is a perfect thing to migrate your current Magento 1 website to the newer Magento 2 version.

Not just because the Magento 1 is no longer officially supported, but for your online store’s sake. As the new Magento 2.4 is positioned itself as a tough contender in the eCommerce platform marketplace.

Technically no one can put Magento 2.4 platform aside simply, because it’s now out of the room to contribute its users.

Still, curious to know more and want to be more sure on the Magento 2.4? Then consult with our Magento experts today.

Feel free to contact us, and we’re responsible as much as we can.

Magento 2.4: All About New Release And Highlights