An Uncanny Year in Review—and What Lies Ahead for 2025

The team at Uncanny Owl looks back on a year defined by lofty peaks and brave new frontiers. But, what lies ahead for 2025?

Earlier this year, the Uncanny Owl team got together for our annual meetup. Last year, we had the privilege of traveling to Athens, Greece for WordCamp Europe 2023. We collaborated with our fellow WordPress-ers and learned a thing or two about the importance of building products that—like the Parthenon—would stand the test of time.

This year, however, our annual meetup had some special significance for yours truly. Much like our team member Anastasia Kolomoytseva who calls Athens home, I had the honor this year of welcoming the team to my home: to the pristine, untouched wilderness of the Canadian Rocky Mountains.

For many members of the team, it was their first time setting foot on Canadian soil. For others, it was their first time crossing the prairies into Western Canada. Still, for others, it was a long overdue return to one of the last true frontiers.

However, whether a particular member was new to the brisk alpine air of the True North or a seasoned mountaineer such as myself, I think I can safely speak for us all when I say that we came away with a shared experience and vision for the future.

You see, if there’s anything that the Rockies inspires in everyone who sets their sights upon them—apart from a sense of awe and wonder—it’s a deep feeling of stewardship.

As we learned last year, the Parthenon has towered over Athens for more than 3,300 years as a testament to the ingenuity of the ancient Greeks. The Canadian Rockies, however, have been standing for 55 to 80 million years as silent witnesses to much of our planet’s history.

Simply to be in their presence is to be reminded of the role that we all play in preserving the environment around us, not just for future generations but for the elk, wolverines, mountain lions, loons, deer, bears, and countless other critters that call the foreboding landscape home.

It is a delicate ecosystem, the balance of which rests in the hands of everyone who enters it—be they resident or visitor. (You might say that, in the Rockies, environmental stewardship is open-source.)

In a similar way, the Uncanny Owl team came away from our excursion to the Rockies with a profound sense of stewardship for another ecosystem; the WordPress ecosystem and the millions of people who inhabit it.

As much as I wished the Uncanny team could have stayed longer in the Rockies, our trip came to an end after an action-packed week. It felt like the team had only just landed before they were returning to their respective corners of the globe, while I stayed behind in mine.

However, when the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve in our various time zones, I know that my coworkers will be looking back on a year of growth, innovation, and, above all, stewardship of our little corner of the WordPress ecosystem.

Here’s a quick look back on how Uncanny Owl has embraced its role as a steward of the WordPress community—and how we plan to carry that spirit forward into 2025.

Building an Ecosystem With New WordPress Integrations

The WordPress ecosystem is as large as it is diverse and dynamic. As such, it can be difficult to get all of its disparate parts working together—call it a blessing and a curse of open-source software.

However, with Uncanny Automator, the Uncanny team helps connect and integrate all kinds of WordPress plugins, tools, and apps, bringing together seemingly divergent technologies.

In 2024, we added even more WordPress integrations—from popular plugins like wpDiscuz to big-name platforms like Stripe—to help WordPress users, businesses, and developers build a more harmonious ecosystem of their own.

In the spirit of stewardship, when we create new WordPress integrations, we don’t just throw up the equivalent of a digital lean-to and call it a day.

At Uncanny Owl, we’re focused on creating deep integrations for real-world use cases. Integrations that enable the creation of meaningful automations that actually save time and money. 

If you haven’t been checking out our blog or if you’re not subscribed to our newsletter, then you may have missed a brand new integration, one that could be saving you time and money right now.

Check out our ever-expanding list of WordPress integrations >>>

New Triggers and Actions for Our Diverse and Dynamic Users

Part of stewardship within the WordPress ecosystem entails expanding the capabilities of WordPress websites. In 2024, we added tons of new triggers and actions, ensuring that Automator’s capabilities kept pace with our users’ demands.

From marketing automation enhancing triggers to e-commerce boosting actions and AI-powered membership engagement filters, in 2024 we focused on giving the WordPress community more ways to automate their workflows.

Our ever-growing list of triggers and actions has empowered our users to create even more complex and creative recipes to match their business goals and objectives in a dynamic and changeable economy.

So, whether you’re looking to automate e-commerce processes, streamline email marketing, or manage memberships, we’ve been hard at work creating the no-code tools you need.

Browse our full list of triggers and actions >>>

Recipe Templates Are 2024’s Must-Have Feature

The Canadian Rockies are absolutely criss-crossed with hiking trails that lead to some of the most breathtaking views on earth. From Ha Ling and Johnston Canyon, to Big Beehive and Plain of Six Glaciers, there’s a trail for every season and every adventurer.

With that in mind, in 2024, the Uncanny Owl team was proud to unveil some tried, tested, and true “trails” of our own in the form of the Recipe Template Library.

You can think of the all new Recipe Template Library like the WordPress equivalent of a list of must-see attractions in Banff or Jasper. These “must-have automations” are so irresistibly powerful that your WordPress website just wouldn’t be complete without them, just as your trip to Banff wouldn’t be complete without a stop at Lake Louise.

Not unlike the terraced steps of Bow Glacier Falls or the heavily-trafficked jaunt up to Grassi Lakes, the recipes in our template library are popular crowd pleasers because they are worth every step (or click, as the case may be).

In 2024, with the introduction of recipe templates, we made these must-have automations and integrations more accessible than ever before. Simply select a template, import it to your WordPress website, then tweak it to your liking and cross another item off your recurring to-do list!

Going into 2025, we’ll be adding even more recipe templates—including some hidden gems (like Boom Lake in Banff) that only the most experienced automators (and now you) would know about.

Countless New Features to Steward Your WordPress Website

In addition to new integrations, triggers, and actions, the Uncanny team spent much of 2024 creating new features for Automator the same way that Parks Canada creates new trails, opens new runs, and clears new campsites in the mountains.

Here are some of the highlights:

• CSV, XML, and JSON File Import: “Pack in, pack out” is a mantra in the Rockies that helps to keep the environment clean. Likewise, in 2024, we gave Automator CSV, XML, and JSON file import support so you can pack your data into a file format and import it with a click, keeping your website clean and organized.
• Custom Actions: Fancy a backcountry camp? Just as you can chart your own course through the mountains, Automator’s Custom Actions feature gives users the ability to create their own integrations.
• Loopable Tokens: Out-and-back trails are great—but loops are double the fun! In addition to Post and User Loops, we added Token Loops so you can get more out of a single recipe.
• Email Attachment Support: No trip to the mountains is complete without the right gear. Similarly, no email is complete without the right attachments. In 2024, Automator gave users the ability to add attachments to their WordPress emails.
• Walkthrough: Automator is built by WordPress experts for WordPress enthusiasts—of all skill levels. Like an introductory hiking trail, the new walkthrough feature gives users the skills they need to become veteran automators.
• More Features: Did you know that Banff has over 1,600 kilometers of hiking trails? That’s to say nothing of the ski runs, horse trails, open valleys, and DIY adventures. Just as there’s no end to the trails in the Rockies, there’s no end to the list of features that the Uncanny team added to Automator in 2024. Recipe import/export, response tokens for outgoing webhooks, and AI-image generation just to mention a few of the highlights.

Want to know more about Automator’s latest features?

Scroll through our changelog to see how much Automator has grown this past year >>>

2025 and Beyond: Infinite Possibilities with the “Everything Plugin”

As the Uncanny team discovered earlier this year, the Canadian Rockies are an endless playground where visitors can choose their own adventure.

Hiking, cross-country skiing, backcountry skiing, snowboarding, rock climbing, kayaking, dirt biking, sight-seeing, spelunking, ice skating, canoeing, camping, dog-sledding, horseback riding, wildlife tours, snowshoeing, gondola rides, mountaintop dinners, and the list goes on and on…and on.

In this regard, Automator is quickly becoming the Canadian Rockies of the WordPress ecosystem: one plugin, infinite possibilities.

With all of the new integrations, addons, and features that we’ve added over the years, Automator gives its users more power now than it ever has before. Dare we say, it gives WordPress users more power than any other plugin available; the power to integrate anything so they can automate everything.

At its core, that is the philosophy of our ethic of stewardship within the WordPress ecosystem; empower the people behind the websites and the environment will take care of itself.

With all of the time and money that Automator has saved its users over the course of 2024, we’re certain that they can plan their very own Rocky Mountain adventure. (If you see me on the trails, make sure to say, “Hi!”)

So, in 2025, whether you’re venturing into the mountains or into an exciting new business, we hope that you choose to take Uncanny Automator along for the ride.

From the Uncanny team, we wish you a happy New Year, and as ever, happy automating!

Brendan Da Costa

Brendan Da Costa is a WordPress content writer with a Shakespearean-level gift of gab (his words, not ours). He left a successful career in economics to pursue his passion for writing and discovered the wonderful world of WordPress while building his own website to showcase his work. As a self-taught enthusiast who spends more time tinkering with plugins and themes than he would care to admit, Brendan writes equally for WordPress beginners and veteran developers alike. With his unique blend of expertise and creativity, he continues to elevate the digital landscape one WordPress article at a time.

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