Plenty of people swear by Wishlists, a polished German app, for Secret Santa. We looked at how it compares with WishApp on price, on the devices you can use, and on what your friends have to do before they can reserve a gift.
Last updated: June 2026
Looking for a Wishlists alternative? Wishlists is a lovely mobile app with the best Secret Santa draw around. But it only runs on phones, and gift-givers have to install it before they can reserve anything. WishApp is free forever, works in every browser and on desktop, and friends reserve straight from a link without installing an app. Of the Wishlists alternatives, WishApp is the one we'd pick.
Each row covers what the apps do today. Wishlists wins a few, and those are marked as well.
| Feature | Wishlists | WishApp |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing & value | ||
| Free forever, no subscription | Freemium | Everything free |
| Unlimited lists and items | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| No ads | Never any ads | No ads |
| All features included, no paywall | Some paid | Yes |
| Platforms & devices | ||
| iPhone, iPad and Android apps | iOS + Android | iOS + Android |
| Full web app to create and manage | Mobile only | Yes |
| Browser extensions | None | Five browsers |
| Raycast quick-add | No | Yes |
| Sharing & reservations | ||
| Friends view a shared list without an account | Yes | Yes |
| Reserve a gift without installing the app | App required | No account needed |
| Hidden reservations (owner cannot see) | Yes | Yes |
| Collaborative lists | No | Yes |
| Gifting features | ||
| Secret Santa / gift exchange | Best-in-class | Yes |
| Reserved and received tracking | Reserved only | Both |
| Group gifting / chip-in | No | Yes |
| Barcode scanner for in-store items | Yes | Not offered |
| Ease of use | ||
| Add from any store by pasting a link | Auto-import | Auto-fills |
| Save a product in one click while browsing | No extension | Yes |
| In-app language support | 29 languages | English + Danish |
Both apps are free to start, and neither shows ads. With WishApp every feature is free forever, and there's no premium tier at all. Wishlists is freemium. The core is free, but extras like priority flags and custom list images sit behind a subscription that ranges from $1.99 a month to a $29.99 lifetime unlock. What's awkward is that Wishlists never tells you which features are paid, so you run into the paywall halfway through using it.
Devices are the big gap. Wishlists is mobile-only, with no web app and no browser extension, so if you shop on a laptop you have to pick up your phone to add anything. The macOS version is an iOS Catalyst build and needs an Apple Silicon Mac. WishApp runs on iPhone, iPad, Android, macOS and the full web, with extensions for Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera and Safari and a Raycast add-on. Your list is the same on all of them.
Sharing is where the choice gets made. In both apps, friends can open a shared link and see the list without an account. To actually reserve a gift on Wishlists, though, they have to download the app and sign up. That's the most common complaint in its reviews, and it leads to people buying duplicates. WishApp lets anyone reserve straight from the link, no app needed. Both hide reservations from the list owner, so the surprise survives in either one.
Wishlists deserves real credit for its Secret Santa, the feature people rave about. There's a spinning draw wheel, budget settings and invitations, and it copes with groups of 20 or more. You could argue it's more polished than WishApp's. WishApp answers with range: it runs Secret Santa too, and adds collaborative lists, group gifting and a reserved-and-received view that remembers a gift came 'from Sarah'. Wishlists has no group chip-in and no shared editing. One thing Wishlists has that WishApp doesn't is a barcode scanner for adding products in a physical store.
Both apps are easy to use every day, and Wishlists is beautiful. Reviewers call it 'stunning' and 'minimalist', and saving from the share sheet on your phone is quick. Where it falls short is reliability and reach. Some users report 'page could not be opened' errors when importing from certain shops, and you can't add anything from a desktop. WishApp fills in the title, image and price from any link, and its extension saves a product in one click while you browse. Wishlists is localized in 29 languages in the app, while WishApp's mobile app is English and Danish only.
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