diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 51c97517..65354872 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@ This software is distributed under the [LGPL 2.1](https://www.gnu.org/licenses/o
 PHPMailer is available on [Packagist](https://packagist.org/packages/phpmailer/phpmailer) (using semantic versioning), and installation via [Composer](https://getcomposer.org) is the recommended way to install PHPMailer. Just add this line to your `composer.json` file:
 
 ```json
-"phpmailer/phpmailer": "^6.11.1"
+"phpmailer/phpmailer": "^7.0.0"
 ```
 
 or run
diff --git a/VERSION b/VERSION
index fac714a3..66ce77b7 100644
--- a/VERSION
+++ b/VERSION
@@ -1 +1 @@
-6.11.1
+7.0.0
diff --git a/changelog.md b/changelog.md
index 5e160767..1c448090 100644
--- a/changelog.md
+++ b/changelog.md
@@ -3,6 +3,12 @@
 ## WIP
 * Use From domain when generating CIDs in msgHTML
 
+## Version 7.0.0 (October 15th, 2025)
+This is exactly the same as 6.11.1 but bumps the major version number to indicate the presence of a BC break in child classes. Specifically, `lang()`, `setLanguage()`, and `$language` are now static, and should be called statically.
+
+## Version 6.12.0 (October 15th, 2025)
+This is exactly the same as 6.10.0, reverting all the changes in 6.11.0 and 6.11.1, which inadvertently introduced a BC break affecting child classes. 6.11.1 has been re-released as 7.0.0.
+
 ## Version 6.11.1 (September 30th, 2025)
 * Avoid function signature problems with the deprecation of `$useimap` in `parseAddresses`.
 
diff --git a/src/PHPMailer.php b/src/PHPMailer.php
index 242c6b38..91512c43 100644
--- a/src/PHPMailer.php
+++ b/src/PHPMailer.php
@@ -768,7 +768,7 @@ class PHPMailer
      *
      * @var string
      */
-    const VERSION = '6.11.1';
+    const VERSION = '7.0.0';
 
     /**
      * Error severity: message only, continue processing.
diff --git a/src/POP3.php b/src/POP3.php
index 2c2cf789..c881a1c3 100644
--- a/src/POP3.php
+++ b/src/POP3.php
@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@ class POP3
      *
      * @var string
      */
-    const VERSION = '6.11.1';
+    const VERSION = '7.0.0';
 
     /**
      * Default POP3 port number.
diff --git a/src/SMTP.php b/src/SMTP.php
index 3772c94a..a36741bf 100644
--- a/src/SMTP.php
+++ b/src/SMTP.php
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ class SMTP
      *
      * @var string
      */
-    const VERSION = '6.11.1';
+    const VERSION = '7.0.0';
 
     /**
      * SMTP line break constant.