Magento 2.2 Update: Latest Features with Important Fixes & Enhancements
Magento Update is available now. Yes…you have heard it right. Magento has come out with its new update Magento 2.2 – Lots of new features, hundreds of functional fixes and improvements!!
Magento 2.2 release encapsulates significant enhancements in platform security and developer experience. It included upgraded technology stack with pipeline deployment. It facilitated separate build and deployment stages that can run separately. After that in the same year, Magento update is launched. It’s really exciting to see Magento update so soon. Let’s see what all new it presents!!
New Features in Magento Update
Magento latest version includes features for both Magento Commerce and Magento open source. The new features promise the customer a great experience and provide merchants with new insight into their online business. Its popularity can be judged by the increase of 48000 Magento websites in a single year from 2016 to 2017. So, let’s delve deeper to see its key features
1. B2B Functionality
It is designed for merchants whose primary customers are firms or businesses, rather than direct consumers. Businesses can create and maintain their own accounts. They can specify teams of buyers with various roles and levels of permission with each account. It includes a flexible API to integrate a variety of ERP solutions. B2B is supported by Magento Commerce (Cloud) Pro subscriptions. Some of its key features are as follows
- Company Account Management.
- Quote Engine.
- Credit purchases for B2B customers.
- Customized catalogs and price lists.
- Updated API for simple ERP integrations.
2. Magento Commerce Starter
Magento Commerce Starter is a smaller Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) version of Magento Cloud. It avails continuous cloud integration tools with unlimited users at affordable prices. Provides complete Production and Staging environment with fast Content Delivery Network (CDN) and DDoS protection. It facilitates 24×7 monitoring and email support for the core application architecture.
3. Improvements to the Magento Commerce (cloud) Deployment Process
This release includes new MCC replacements. It is replaced by ece-tools and ece-patches that do not require a full installation of base code and the patch.
4. Bundled Extensions
Magento commerce bundles with third-party extensions for the first time as Magento Social. Bundled extensions establish a connection between your store and your corporate Facebook account. These are responsible for creating a page with products from your catalog. A click to the product will redirect you to the corresponding product page in your Magento store. Check out best Magento hosting providers.
5. Integrated Signifyd Fraud Protection
It will help merchants to identify fraudulent orders and cover them with 100% chargeback protection.
6. Significant Enhancements in Platform Security and Developer Experience
Security is upgraded with the removal of unserialize calls and improved hashing algorithm. It protects against dangerous code execution attacks.
7. 30-day Free Trials Available
These trials are available for Starter and Pro projects in Magento 2.2.1. It will auto-provision your project to configure basic settings to get started. It will give you access to a new Onboarding Portal.
Magento 2.2 Open Source Features
1. Staging and Production Environments in the UI
The new projects will include Staging and Production environments in the Project Web Interface. Existing accounts can be privileged by entering a ticket to update.
2. Upgraded Technology Stack
Magento update dropped support for PHP 5.6 and Varnish 3. It now supports PHP 7.1 and Varnish 5, along with Redis 3.2 and MySQL 5.7.
3. Pipeline Deployment
This process enables deployment stages to minimize production system downtime for site updates. Downtime refers to the amount of time required to transfer static files and compiled code to the server. Pipeline deployment process avails easy management of configuration between environments.
4. Performance gains with the betterment of Indexing, Cart, and Cache Operations.
Customers can browse and shop at frontend while indexing runs uninterruptedly. Long-running indexers can operate in batches for better memory management. Cart improvements facilitate a buyer with a cart more than 300 line items. Merchants can process a cart with at least 300 line items. Varnish cache configuration includes saint and grace modes. Varnish presents a cached page to the customers. Cache invalidation logic optimization boosts the cache hit ratios.
Magento Update 2.2.2 Features
Magento update is released just a few time after Magento 2.2. It will accelerate sales growth and operate with efficiency. It will make the Magento operations more streamlined. Incorporates important fixes to core features. Let’s have a look at some of its enhancements. Check out free Magneto themes.
1. Advanced Reporting Powered by Magento Business Intelligence
This new feature gives access to order, product, and customer reports from the Magento 2.2 Admin. These help to make data-driven decisions to devise new visions. This reporting facility is availed through integration with Magento Business Intelligence (MBI). MBI generates analytics by collecting data from Magento. For this, the minimum requirements are as follows
- A real domain name for Magento store website.
- HTTPS with a valid certificate.
- Subscription to the Advanced Reporting.
Magento Admin → Stores → Settings → Configuration → General → Advanced Reporting
You also have the option to set a preferable time for data collection to avoid increased system loading time. It gives you access to 20 reports and 3 dashboards to improve your store performance.
2. Magento Shipping (Powered by Temando)
Magento Shipping is an end-to-end solution to provide greater advanced shipping and fulfillment. It effectively reduces cart abandonment and unlocks business efficiencies to get faster growth. It enables merchants to connect with global carriers. Magento 2 shipping promises to address the full spectrum of merchant needs.
3. Streamlined Instant Purchase Checkout
An instant purchase option is provided to you to bypass steps in the checkout process. It uses the previously stored payment credentials and shipping information. Basically, it speeds up the checkout process. It avails the Instant Purchase button below the Add to Cart button on the product page. But it needs to fulfill some requirements. The prerequisite is like the customer should sign into the account. And, the account holds the default billing and shipping address etc. It avails many safe payment methods for customers.
To configure Instant Purchase, navigate to
Admin sidebar → Stores → Settings → Configuration
Now, configure payment method vault and enable instant purchase here.
4. Integrated Dotmailer Marketing Automation Software
Magento new version includes dotmailer marketing automation. It becomes one of the first e-commerce solutions to introduce marketing automation software with their core product. It produces email communication by using data from your Magento store.
5. Magento Functional Testing Framework
The Magento Functional Testing Framework (MTFT) is the new open-source, cross-platform testing solution. It facilitates functional testing. It can be performed anytime. Reduces the efforts in regression testing. It will help to improve traceability, modularity, customizability, maintainability, and readability.
Closing Words
Magento 2 was released in 2015 with an aim to provide new ways to increase user engagement, smooth navigation, and better conversion rates for store owners. From that time, it is continuously growing. Magento releases updates regularly. It commits to present complete e-commerce solutions to its customers. If you want to create an awesome Magento e-commerce store, you can use our Magento theme builder software. It incorporates latest design features to get you started on your ecommerce business website. We have already started working on this update and are more than eager to provide support in the upcoming version of TemplateToaster website builder.
Found any bugs or issues after the update? Let’s discuss in the comments below.
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