Reasonably considered as a most secure CMS for eCommerce, Magento is solid for keeping its high level of performance, being in full compliance with the changing legislative requirements, and away from the security threats.
Magento Commerce 2.3.3 includes more than 100 security fixes, adds performance improvements, and about 190 product quality enhancements.
Read on to learn what improvements we are about to relish. We’ll do our best to cover the most critical of them.
Table of Contents
Main New Enhancements Overview
Changes to Magento 2 Native Payment Integrations
Based on the Payment Services Directive as of September 14, 2019, merchants that do business in the UK and EU―all other locations are also encouraged as a best practice―shall comply with at least two of the Strong Customer Authentication (SCA) requirements of the Payment Services Directive. Within the key components of these requirements are that there should be something only a customer:
- has (password/PIN),
- knows (by phone/ hardware token),
- is (biometric authentication, such as facial recognition or fingerprint).
With that regard, European banks are entitled to decline payments that do not meet the above-mentioned requirements. Low-value transactions might be still an exception.
More data on this is available here.
To remain in full compliance with the PSD2, it’s recommended to:
- For Braintree, use the official integration extension available on Magento Marketplace. It supports 3D Secure 2.0 verification except for those that run on JavaScript SDK v2.
- For Authorize.net, usage of the official integration extension that is available on Magento Marketplace is also recommended. It supports 3D Secure 2.0 verification through CardinalCommerce and some other 3rd party services.
- For other payment methods, it’s recommended to either use payment integrations that are available on Magento Marketplace or clarify directly recommended payment methods with PSD2 support.
Note that Cybersource and eWay payment modules have been deprecated in order to comply with the recent regulations. The official Magento Marketplace extensions are recommended for use instead.
Introduction of PHP 7.3 & Varnish 6.2.0 Support
Please note that the security support for PHP 7.1 ends on December 1, 2019―just as Magento 2.2 won’t be supported starting from 2020 any longer.
An upgrade would be required to remain compliant with the Payment Card Industry (PCI) requirements to ensure your Magento 2-based site maintains the highest possible level of security and performance.
When it comes to 3rd party extensions available on Magento Marketplace, their new versions will have to be compatible with PHP 7.3 in order to pass all the quality assurance checks and go live.
Massive Security Fixes
In its pre-release notes, Magento claims to reduce backlog significantly―they’ve included practically 100 security fixes based on the reported issues.
Improved Google PageSpeed Insights Score
Much has been done to speed up loading times and improve the customer shopping experience. According to the data available on the web, the Google PageSpeed Insights score has been improved up to 5 times. This has been achieved by:
- Displaying text while web-fonts load in the background,
- Moving non-critical CSS items to the end of the loading queue.
Numerous Products Quality Enhancements
Magento claims to introduce enhancements for more than 190 products. Some of them include as follows:
Feedback on the Admin User Experience
Feedback on the Admin User Experience (Image credit)
Don’t be surprised if you are asked either to accept or decline ‘admin usage data collection’ after the initial installation. This is for the reason that Magento does its best to understand and enhance the Admin user experience. For that, it will track user actions and events on the Admin panel and some other related products and services. Magento affirms that no administrator will be identified individually, and it is possible to change the setup at any time.
To make changes, go to Stores > Settings > Configuration > Advanced > Admin.
Page Builder Upgrade
Now, merchants will have more control over content creation when using the Page Builder. As of writing this, the official release notes offer data about the compatibility with Magento 2.3.2 only. However, from here, we get to know that:
- HTML content management becomes much more effortless for the non-techies,
- Products order can be explicitly defined now,
- Inline editing has been also improved.
GraphQL
GraphQL functionality has been extended. Additionally, coverage for PayPal payment integrations, gift cards, and store credit features have been improved.
From now on, the following tasks are supported:
- Adding configurable product to cart.
- Shopping carts updates. For guest users, the ability to apply/remove gift cards and check cart balance.
- For logged-in users, the ability to redeem gift cards & convert to store credit balance.
- Payments processing through PayPal express checkout and other supported PayPal methods, Athorize.net, and Braintree.
Google Shopping Ads Channel
Ever wished to advertise and sell Magento products? Great news, now, the extension that allows integrating Google Merchant Center and Google Ads is a part of Magento core code. So, from now, you’ll be able to quickly sign up without extra extension download required.
(Follow the link to learn more: Google Shopping ads Channel in Magento)
In Magento 2.3.3, you’ll see multiple Vendor-developed extension enhancements (Amazon Pay, Dotgital, Yotpo, Vertex, etc.), Magento Shipping and inventory management improvements, infrastructure enhancements (like WYSIWYG editor upgrade, e.g.), and so much more!
Additionally, some backward incompatible changes have also taken place. For more details, click here.
For full details on Magento Commerce 2.3.3 and Magento Open Source 2.3.3, please see the official documentation.
Stay tuned and keep your Magento-2 based stores secure and up-to-date!
