DEV Community: Yukesh Rajbanshi

Will AI IDEs Like Cursor and Trae Replace WordPress Developers? After Building Entire Themes and Plugins, I Think the Answer Is Complicated

Yukesh Rajbanshi — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 16:42:06 +0000

A year ago, if someone told me I could build a fully custom WordPress theme and custom plugins in days instead of weeks, I would have been skeptical.

Today, after building complete WordPress projects using AI IDEs such as Cursor (and experimenting with tools like Trae AI), I can confidently say:

Building custom WordPress themes has become dramatically easier.

Not because WordPress itself became easier.

Because AI has changed the development workflow.

The Traditional WordPress Development Process

A typical custom theme project often required:

Planning templates
Creating page layouts
Building custom post types
Writing archive templates
Creating custom search pages
Implementing AJAX functionality
Debugging PHP issues
Reading WordPress documentation constantly

Even experienced developers could spend days implementing relatively simple features.

Enter AI IDEs

When using Cursor or Trae AI, the workflow changes completely.

Instead of searching for:

"How do I create a custom taxonomy archive template?"

You simply ask:

"Create a WordPress custom taxonomy archive for movies with pagination, SEO-friendly URLs, and schema markup."

Within seconds, you get a working starting point.

The same applies to:

Custom post types
Theme options
Widgets
AJAX handlers
Search functionality
REST API integrations
Admin panels
Plugin development

The amount of boilerplate code AI can generate is honestly impressive.

My Experience Building a Large WordPress Project

Recently I built a fairly large WordPress project almost entirely with the help of Cursor.

The project includes:

Custom theme architecture
Multiple content types
Search functionality
Dynamic pages
Portal-style features
Various integrations
Custom plugins and extensions

Many features that would traditionally take hours were created in minutes.

Not because AI magically solved everything.

But because it handled repetitive coding tasks while I focused on architecture and testing.

Custom Plugins Are Surprisingly Easy Now

One thing that shocked me was plugin development.

A few years ago, building a plugin required:

Understanding hooks
Actions
Filters
Settings APIs
Admin interfaces
Security practices

Now AI can generate a complete plugin structure almost instantly.

For example:

Create a WordPress plugin that tracks post views, stores data efficiently, adds an admin dashboard, and exposes a REST API endpoint.

You instantly get:

Plugin headers
Activation hooks
Database creation
Admin menus
API routes
Security checks

Of course, you still need to review everything carefully.

But the starting point appears almost immediately.

Does This Mean WordPress Developers Are Finished?

I don't think so.

But I do think the role is changing.

The value is no longer:

"I know how to write a WordPress loop."

AI already knows that.

The value is becoming:

Architecture decisions
Security reviews
Performance optimization
Scalability planning
UX decisions
Debugging complex issues
Understanding business requirements

The developer who knows how to use AI effectively may become significantly more productive than the developer who refuses to use it.

The Real Risk: False Confidence

AI can generate code very quickly.

The problem is that generated code often:

Works initially
Looks professional
Passes basic testing

But may contain:

Security vulnerabilities
Inefficient database queries
Poor architecture
Duplicate functionality
Technical debt

This is where experience still matters.

You need to understand why the code works, not just whether it works.

What AI Has Changed For Me

Before AI:

More time writing code
More time searching documentation
More time debugging boilerplate

After AI:

More time planning
More time reviewing
More time testing
Less time typing

The bottleneck is no longer writing code.

The bottleneck is making good decisions.

Could Someone Build an Entire WordPress Business Using AI?

Honestly?

Probably yes.

A motivated person with:

Basic PHP knowledge
WordPress fundamentals
Good prompting skills
Patience for testing

can build surprisingly advanced themes and plugins today.

Projects that once required a team can sometimes be prototyped by a single developer using AI assistance.

My Take

I don't think Cursor, Trae AI, Copilot, or future AI IDEs will eliminate WordPress developers.

I do think they will eliminate a lot of repetitive WordPress development work.

The developers who learn how to collaborate with AI will likely outperform those who treat AI as a threat rather than a tool.

The biggest question isn't:

Will AI replace WordPress developers?

The bigger question is:

Will WordPress developers who use AI replace WordPress developers who don't?

Do you think AI will reduce demand for WordPress developers?

I Built a Search Engine & Internet Portal on Top of WordPress Using PHP and Cursor AI — Is This a Good Practice?

Yukesh Rajbanshi — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 16:35:47 +0000

Over the last few months, I've been working on a project called Niriv, a custom WordPress-powered internet portal that goes far beyond a traditional blog or news website.

What started as a WordPress theme gradually evolved into something much larger:

Search engine features
News aggregation
Business directories
Knowledge panels
Weather information
Horoscope sections
Classified listings
Chatrooms
Movie content
Event pages
Custom archives and search experiences
Various portal-style services

The project currently contains hundreds of files and thousands of lines of PHP, JavaScript, CSS, and WordPress integrations.

What makes this interesting is that a significant portion of the development was accelerated using Cursor AI.

Why WordPress?

Many developers would immediately ask:

"Why not Laravel, Next.js, Django, or a custom framework?"

The answer is simple.

WordPress already provides:

User authentication
Content management
Media management
SEO foundations
Plugin ecosystem
Admin dashboard
Database abstraction
REST API

Instead of rebuilding those pieces from scratch, I focused on building custom functionality on top of WordPress.

Features I Built

Some notable features inside the project include:

Search Portal

Custom search templates and search-related functionality designed to behave more like a portal than a traditional WordPress search page.

Knowledge Panels

Entity-style information panels similar to what users expect from modern search engines.

Business Directory

Custom archive templates and business listing functionality.

Classified Marketplace

A separate content system for classified ads.

Community Features

Chatroom functionality and user interaction components.

Information Services
Weather
Forex rates
Event calendars
Horoscopes
News content
Performance Optimizations

While building the project, I also spent time optimizing:

PHP compatibility
XML sitemap handling
Custom caching logic
Frontend rendering
Asset organization
How Cursor AI Changed My Workflow

The biggest surprise wasn't the code itself.

It was how much faster development became with an AI IDE.

Instead of:

Searching Stack Overflow
Reading documentation
Writing boilerplate
Debugging manually

I could often:

Describe the feature
Let Cursor generate a first version
Review the code
Refine and test

For example:

Creating custom archive templates
Generating WordPress hooks
Building admin interfaces
Refactoring large PHP files
Creating CSS systems
Generating repetitive code structures

became significantly faster.

What AI IDEs Are Really Good At

After using Cursor extensively, I think AI performs best at:

Boilerplate Generation

Creating WordPress templates, hooks, classes, and repetitive code.

Refactoring

Improving existing code without manually editing hundreds of lines.

Code Discovery

Understanding large projects and locating where features are implemented.

Rapid Prototyping

Testing ideas in minutes instead of hours.

What AI Still Doesn't Do Well

Despite the hype, AI isn't replacing developers.

I still had to:

Design the architecture
Make technical decisions
Review generated code
Fix logic issues
Handle security concerns
Optimize performance

Cursor can generate code.

It cannot reliably decide whether that code is the best architectural choice.

The Biggest Question

As the project grew, I noticed something interesting.

The faster AI generated features, the easier it became to keep adding more and more functionality.

At some point I started asking myself:

Am I building features because users need them, or because AI makes it easy to create them?

That's a question many AI-assisted developers will probably face.

Is This Good Practice?

That's what I'd like feedback on from the community.

The project is essentially a large custom application running inside WordPress:

Hundreds of theme files
Extensive PHP customization
Portal functionality
Search features
Community tools
Information services

Would you continue scaling something like this inside WordPress?

Or would you eventually migrate parts of it into a separate framework or microservices architecture?

I'm especially interested in hearing from developers who have used AI IDEs like Cursor, Windsurf, or GitHub Copilot for large projects.

Has AI made you more productive, or has it simply made it easier to accumulate technical debt faster?

I'd love to hear your thoughts. 🚀

Tech Stack

PHP 8.1+
WordPress
JavaScript
CSS
Cursor AI
Custom WordPress Theme (Niriv)