WordPress 4.6 will introduce WP_Term_Query . This new class brings parity between taxonomyTaxonomy A taxonomy is a way to group things together. In WordPress, some common taxonomies are category, link, tag, or post format. https://codex.wordpress.org/Taxonomies#Default_Taxonomies. term queries and WP’s other content type queries: WP_Query , WP_Comment_Query , and WP_User_Query . And – as in the case of posts, comments, and users – the get_terms() function has been converted to a wrapper for the new WP_Term_Query .

Aside from support for querying by term_taxonomy_id #37074, no functional changes to get_terms() will be introduced in 4.6; 100% backward compatibility with previous uses is the goal for this release.

For more background on the change, see #35381.