WordPress Playground Blueprints

Overview

A Blueprint is a JSON file that declaratively configures a WordPress Playground instance — installing plugins/themes, setting options, running PHP/SQL, manipulating files, and more.

Core principle: Blueprints are trusted JSON-only declarations. No arbitrary JavaScript. They work on web, Node.js, and CLI.

Quick Start Template

{
  "$schema": "https://playground.wordpress.net/blueprint-schema.json",
  "landingPage": "/wp-admin/",
  "preferredVersions": { "php": "8.3", "wp": "latest" },
  "steps": [{ "step": "login" }]
}

Top-Level Properties

All optional. Only documented keys are allowed — the schema rejects unknown properties.

preferredVersions Values

• php: Major.minor only: "7.4", "8.0", "8.1", "8.2", "8.3", "8.4", "8.5", or "latest". Patch versions like "7.4.1" are invalid. Check the schema for currently supported versions.
• wp: Recent major versions, "latest", "beta", "nightly"/"trunk", or a URL to a custom zip. The schema also accepts false for PHP-only Playground; do not combine wp: false with WordPress-only fields such as plugins, siteOptions, login, or WordPress-only steps.

Shorthands vs Steps

Shorthands (login, plugins, siteOptions, constants) are expanded and prepended to steps in an unspecified order. Use explicit steps when execution order matters.

Resource References

Resources tell Playground where to find files. Used by installPlugin, installTheme, writeFile, writeFiles, importWxr, etc.

git:directory — Installing from GitHub

{
  "resource": "git:directory",
  "url": "https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg",
  "ref": "trunk",
  "refType": "branch",
  "path": "/"
}

• When using a branch or tag name for ref, you must set refType ("branch" | "tag" | "commit" | "refname"). Without it, only "HEAD" resolves reliably.
• path selects a subdirectory (defaults to repo root).

literal:directory — Inline File Trees

{
  "resource": "literal:directory",
  "name": "my-plugin",
  "files": {
    "plugin.php": "<?php /* Plugin Name: My Plugin */ ?>",
    "includes": {
      "helper.php": "<?php // helper code ?>"
    }
  }
}

• files uses nested objects for subdirectories — keys are filenames or directory names, values are plain strings (file content) or objects (subdirectories). Never use resource references as values.
• Do NOT use path separators in keys (e.g. "includes/helper.php" is wrong — use a nested "includes": { "helper.php": "..." } object).

Steps Reference

Every step requires "step": "<name>". Any step can optionally include "progress": { "weight": 1, "caption": "Installing..." } for UI feedback.

Plugin & Theme Installation

{
  "step": "installPlugin",
  "pluginData": { "resource": "wordpress.org/plugins", "slug": "gutenberg" },
  "options": { "activate": true, "targetFolderName": "gutenberg" },
  "ifAlreadyInstalled": "overwrite"
}

{
  "step": "installTheme",
  "themeData": { "resource": "wordpress.org/themes", "slug": "twentytwentyfour" },
  "options": { "activate": true, "importStarterContent": true },
  "ifAlreadyInstalled": "overwrite"
}

• Use pluginData / themeData — NOT the deprecated pluginZipFile / themeZipFile.
• pluginData / themeData accept any FileReference or DirectoryReference — a zip URL, a wordpress.org/plugins slug, a git:directory, or a literal:directory (no zip wrapper needed).
• options.activate controls activation. No need for a separate activatePlugin/activateTheme step when using installPlugin/installTheme.
• ifAlreadyInstalled: "overwrite" | "skip" | "error"

Activation (standalone)

Only needed for plugins/themes already on disk (e.g. after writeFile/writeFiles):

{ "step": "activatePlugin", "pluginPath": "my-plugin/my-plugin.php" }

{ "step": "activateTheme", "themeFolderName": "twentytwentyfour" }

File Operations

{ "step": "writeFile", "path": "/wordpress/wp-content/mu-plugins/custom.php", "data": "<?php // code" }

data accepts a plain string (as shown above) or a resource reference (e.g. { "resource": "url", "url": "https://..." }).

{
  "step": "writeFiles",
  "writeToPath": "/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/",
  "filesTree": {
    "resource": "literal:directory",
    "name": "my-plugin",
    "files": {
      "plugin.php": "<?php\n/*\nPlugin Name: My Plugin\n*/",
      "includes": {
        "helpers.php": "<?php // helpers"
      }
    }
  }
}

writeFiles requires a DirectoryReference (literal:directory or git:directory) as filesTree — not a plain object.

Other file operations: mkdir, cp, mv, rm, rmdir, unzip.

Running Code

runPHP:

{ "step": "runPHP", "code": "<?php require '/wordpress/wp-load.php'; update_option('key', 'value');" }

GOTCHA: You must require '/wordpress/wp-load.php'; to use any WordPress functions.

wp-cli:

{ "step": "wp-cli", "command": "wp post create --post_type=page --post_title='Hello' --post_status=publish" }

The step name is wp-cli (with hyphen), NOT cli or wpcli.

runSql:

{ "step": "runSql", "sql": { "resource": "literal", "name": "q.sql", "contents": "UPDATE wp_options SET option_value='val' WHERE option_name='key';" } }

Site Configuration

{ "step": "setSiteOptions", "options": { "blogname": "My Site", "blogdescription": "A tagline" } }

{ "step": "defineWpConfigConsts", "consts": { "WP_DEBUG": true } }

{ "step": "setSiteLanguage", "language": "en_US" }

{ "step": "defineSiteUrl", "siteUrl": "https://example.com" }

Other Steps

Common Patterns

Inline mu-plugin (quick custom code)

{
  "step": "writeFile",
  "path": "/wordpress/wp-content/mu-plugins/custom.php",
  "data": "<?php\n// mu-plugins load automatically — no activation needed, no require wp-load.php\nadd_filter('show_admin_bar', '__return_false');"
}

Inline plugin with multiple files

{
  "step": "writeFiles",
  "writeToPath": "/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/",
  "filesTree": {
    "resource": "literal:directory",
    "name": "my-plugin",
    "files": {
      "my-plugin.php": "<?php\n/*\nPlugin Name: My Plugin\n*/\nrequire __DIR__ . '/includes/main.php';",
      "includes": {
        "main.php": "<?php // main logic"
      }
    }
  }
}

Then activate it with a separate step:

{ "step": "activatePlugin", "pluginPath": "my-plugin/my-plugin.php" }

Plugin from a GitHub branch

{
  "step": "installPlugin",
  "pluginData": {
    "resource": "git:directory",
    "url": "https://github.com/user/repo",
    "ref": "feature-branch",
    "refType": "branch",
    "path": "/"
  }
}

Common Mistakes

Full Reference

This skill covers the most common steps and patterns. For the complete API, see:

• Blueprint docs: https://wordpress.github.io/wordpress-playground/blueprints
• JSON schema: https://playground.wordpress.net/blueprint-schema.json

Additional steps not covered above: runPHPWithOptions (run PHP with custom ini settings), runWpInstallationWizard, and resource types vfs and bundled (for advanced embedding scenarios).

Blueprint Bundles

Bundles are self-contained packages that include a blueprint.json along with all the resources it references (plugins, themes, WXR files, etc.). Instead of hosting assets externally, bundle them alongside the blueprint.

Bundle Structure

my-bundle/
├── blueprint.json          ← must be at the root
├── my-plugin.zip           ← zipped plugin directory
├── theme.zip
└── content/
    └── sample-content.wxr

Plugins and themes must be zipped before bundling — installPlugin expects a zip, not a raw directory. To create the zip from a plugin directory:

cd my-bundle
zip -r my-plugin.zip my-plugin/

Referencing Bundled Resources

Use the bundled resource type to reference files within the bundle:

{
  "step": "installPlugin",
  "pluginData": {
    "resource": "bundled",
    "path": "/my-plugin.zip"
  },
  "options": { "activate": true }
}

{
  "step": "importWxr",
  "file": {
    "resource": "bundled",
    "path": "/content/sample-content.wxr"
  }
}

Creating a Bundle Step by Step

1. Create the bundle directory and add blueprint.json at its root.
2. Write your plugin/theme source files in a subdirectory (e.g. my-plugin/my-plugin.php).
3. Zip the plugin directory: zip -r my-plugin.zip my-plugin/
4. Reference it in blueprint.json using { "resource": "bundled", "path": "/my-plugin.zip" }.

Full example — a bundle that installs a custom plugin:

dashboard-widget-bundle/
├── blueprint.json
├── dashboard-widget.zip        ← zip of dashboard-widget/
└── dashboard-widget/           ← plugin source (kept for editing)
    └── dashboard-widget.php

{
  "$schema": "https://playground.wordpress.net/blueprint-schema.json",
  "landingPage": "/wp-admin/",
  "preferredVersions": { "php": "8.3", "wp": "latest" },
  "steps": [
    { "step": "login" },
    {
      "step": "installPlugin",
      "pluginData": { "resource": "bundled", "path": "/dashboard-widget.zip" },
      "options": { "activate": true }
    }
  ]
}

Distribution Formats

GOTCHA: Local directory bundles always need --blueprint-may-read-adjacent-files for the CLI to read bundled resources. Without it, any "resource": "bundled" reference will fail with a "File not found" error. ZIP bundles don't need this flag — all files are self-contained inside the archive.

Testing Blueprints

Inline Blueprints (quick test, no bundles)

Minify the blueprint JSON (no extra whitespace), encode it once with encodeURIComponent(), prepend https://playground.wordpress.net/#, and open the URL in a browser:

https://playground.wordpress.net/#%7B%22%24schema%22%3A%22https%3A%2F%2Fplayground.wordpress.net%2Fblueprint-schema.json%22%2C%22preferredVersions%22%3A%7B%22php%22%3A%228.3%22%2C%22wp%22%3A%22latest%22%7D%2C%22steps%22%3A%5B%7B%22step%22%3A%22login%22%7D%5D%7D

Very large blueprints may exceed browser URL length limits; use the CLI or a hosted Blueprint URL instead. For share-link details, use wp-playground/references/website.md.

Local CLI Testing

Interactive server (keeps running, opens in browser):

# Directory bundle — requires --blueprint-may-read-adjacent-files
npx @wp-playground/cli server --blueprint=./my-bundle/ --blueprint-may-read-adjacent-files

# ZIP bundle — self-contained, no extra flags needed
npx @wp-playground/cli server --blueprint=./bundle.zip

Headless validation (runs blueprint and exits):

npx @wp-playground/cli run-blueprint --blueprint=./my-bundle/ --blueprint-may-read-adjacent-files

Testing with WordPress Playground

Use the wp-playground skill for local or browser testing. For CLI testing, follow wp-playground/references/cli.md with --blueprint=<path-or-url>; for directory bundles, pass --blueprint-may-read-adjacent-files.