Overview

Given the low usaeg of the Classic theme this will be considered for retirement to reduce maintence and increase development velocity.  This will provide more resources to make greater improvements in other areas

Objectives

• Reduce maintenance for the system overall
• Reduce tech debt
• Simplify the system overall

Updates

19/11/2024

Research and feedback has been received on the usage of the classic theme.  The current usage is extrememly low, it is even lower than several third party themes. The decision has been made to remove the Classic theme from core. There will be an extended timeline before this will occur.  There will be further communications on the timeline in the next few weeks.

09/12/2024

With only 1.6% of registered sites using Classic theme the decision to deprecate and remove Classic Theme from Moodle core will proceed.  The current timeline is 

• From Moodle 5.0 until Moodle 5.3 Classic theme will continue to be supported
  • Testing will continue as it is currently conducted with every release
  • New functionality will be supported in Classic theme
  • Accessibility bugs and significant issues will continue to be addressed 
  • Minor and more trivial issues will be deprioritised

• As part of the Moodle 6.0 release, Classic theme will be moved out of core and into the plugins directory.
  • No new features will be supported in Classic for the Moodle 6.0 release and beyond
  • Any remaining issues that only affect Classic will be closed
  • Some CSS and code cleanup will occur in Moodle 6.0 and subsequent versions, these will occur in line with the current deprecation policies.