Smart Wishlist vs. First Wish ‑ Wishlist & Boards: An In-Depth Comparison

Introduction

Choosing the right wishlist tool is more than toggling a feature on a storefront — it’s about preserving purchase intent, recovering lost conversions, and building a path to repeat customers. Shopify merchants face thousands of app choices, and picking a single-purpose app without understanding trade-offs can lead to feature gaps, duplicated costs, or theme conflicts.

Short answer: Smart Wishlist is a lightweight, easy-to-install wishlist focused on simple one-click saving and guest-friendly sharing; First Wish ‑ Wishlist & Boards targets curated lists and analytics but shows limited adoption and feedback so far. For merchants who want more than a standalone wishlist — loyalty, referrals, reviews, and wishlist working together — an integrated retention suite can deliver better value for money than stacking single-point apps.

The purpose of this post is to provide a clear, feature-by-feature comparison of Smart Wishlist and First Wish ‑ Wishlist & Boards. The analysis covers features, pricing and value, integrations, performance and implementation, and support. After the direct comparison, this post will explain how an all-in-one retention platform addresses “app fatigue” and offer a unified alternative.

Smart Wishlist vs. First Wish ‑ Wishlist & Boards: At a Glance

The table above summarizes the primary trade-offs. The sections that follow unpack these categories in detail.

Feature Comparison

Wishlist UX and Customer Experience

One-click saving and friction

Smart Wishlist emphasizes one-click saving even for guest visitors, which lowers friction for casual browsers. The ability to save without creating an account reduces abandonment of intent signals and can increase re-engagement opportunities.

First Wish also supports both anonymous visitors and logged-in customers, and it promotes cross-device sync for logged-in users. Its focus on curated boards means customers can organize items into multiple lists, which is useful for gift planning or event-driven shopping.

Key takeaways:

• Smart Wishlist favors speed and minimal friction.
• First Wish prioritizes organization with boards and cross-device sync for authenticated customers.

Sharing and social behavior

Both apps support sharing wishlists or boards via email, social media, and messaging apps. Social sharing can drive referral-like traffic and help close conversions when friends or family purchase from shared lists.

Smart Wishlist highlights shareable lists as a core capability, positioning sharing as a conversion lever for “window shoppers.” First Wish positions curated lists as shareable and private options, making it more suitable for gift registries and social planning features.

Guest vs. logged-in behavior

A key difference is where the emphasis lies:

• Smart Wishlist: built for guests and logged-in users equally, with one-click saves for guests.
• First Wish: supports guests, but the value-add appears when customers are logged in to sync across devices and manage multiple boards.

For stores that avoid forcing accounts or prioritize mobile users, guest-friendly saving is a major UX win.

Organization: Single Wishlist vs. Boards

First Wish’s standout feature set revolves around boards — multiple curated lists per customer that can be private or public. This approach is helpful for stores that see user behavior around event planning, wedding registries, or repeat wishlists across seasons.

Smart Wishlist supports unlimited wishlists according to its feature summary, but its UX messaging centers on simplicity: save now, share, and convert later. If a merchant needs advanced organizational features like named boards and sophisticated sharing controls, First Wish’s terminology suggests a closer fit — though the practical implementation and admin controls should be tested in the merchant’s live theme.

Admin Tools and Reporting

First Wish claims an admin dashboard with insights into wishlist activity, best-performing products, and activity reports. For merchants who want usage metrics without building custom analytics, that dashboard can be useful.

Smart Wishlist lists JavaScript and REST APIs, suggesting that merchants with developers can extract data or push wishlist events into analytics or email automation platforms. However, Smart Wishlist does not emphasize a built-in analytics dashboard in the product description.

If a merchant needs out-of-the-box usage metrics, First Wish may be a better starting point. If the merchant prefers to own the data pipeline (e.g., send wishlist events into Klaviyo or a BI tool), Smart Wishlist’s APIs provide flexibility.

API and Extensibility

Smart Wishlist explicitly lists JavaScript and REST APIs, which opens possibilities for:

• Custom events to analytics systems
• Triggering emails based on wishlist actions
• Integrations into storefront customizations or headless setups

First Wish does not list developer APIs in the provided description. For merchants planning advanced integrations, especially with third-party automation tools, Smart Wishlist's API support offers more extensibility.

Performance and Theme Safety

Smart Wishlist advertises a lightweight payload and claims it “doesn’t break your theme upon uninstall.” That messaging addresses a common merchant fear: apps that modify theme code and leave behind broken markup when removed.

First Wish does not state explicit claims about payload or uninstall safety. Merchants should review the app’s theme modification behavior during trial and confirm whether the app uses app blocks or manipulates theme.liquid files.

Recommendation:

• For stores where page speed and theme integrity are essential, favor apps that advertise a lightweight implementation and clean uninstall flow — and always test on a staging theme.

Internationalization and Customizable Labels

First Wish mentions label customization and translation, which benefits stores that serve multiple languages or want to tailor UI text for brand voice.

Smart Wishlist does not emphasize translation in the feature list, so check whether its UI strings can be modified or localized before committing.

Security, Privacy, and Data Residency

Both apps list wishlist support for anonymous users. If a merchant plans to collect identifiable data or use wishlist actions in email campaigns, review each app’s privacy policy and how wishlist data is stored and exported. Smart Wishlist’s API could allow more direct data control, but merchants should confirm encryption, access controls, and whether any third-party partners receive the data.

Pricing & Value

Pricing is often the decisive factor for small and mid-size merchants. The two apps take different approaches.

Smart Wishlist Pricing

• Standard plan: $4.99 / month

Pros:

• Simple, predictable pricing.
• Low entry cost makes it attractive for small stores that only need wishlist functionality.

Cons:

• Appears to be a single plan; merchants needing reporting or higher-level features may still need other apps.
• Value depends on whether wishlist events can be used in existing marketing stacks via the API.

Verdict on value: For merchants who only need a fast, inexpensive wishlist with guest saving and shareable lists, Smart Wishlist offers strong value for money.

First Wish Pricing

• Free plan: Free (1000 wishlist adds/month)
• Beginner: $9.90 / month (5000 adds/month, unlimited boards, sharing)
• Advanced: $19.90 / month (20,000 adds/month)
• Pro: $29.90 / month (50,000 adds/month)

Pros:

• Free tier is useful for testing or very small stores.
• Tiered add limits help scale costs with usage.
• Boards and sharing included in paid tiers.

Cons:

• Add limits introduce a usage cap that may be hard to predict if wishlist usage spikes (e.g., during gift season).
• Costs scale with activity; for stores with heavy social traffic or large catalogs, higher tiers may be required.
• Single review and 1.0 rating raises questions about maturity and support availability.

Verdict on value: First Wish is attractive for stores that need multiple organized boards and are comfortable with usage-based tiers. For merchants with unpredictable wishlist volumes, usage caps may necessitate upgrading, which should be modeled against expected ROI.

Comparing Value for Money

“Better value for money” depends on needs:

• If the objective is a low-cost, minimal wishlist that just works: Smart Wishlist.
• If the objective is curated boards, cross-device sync, and admin reporting: First Wish (assuming features meet quality expectations).
• For merchants who want wishlist capability plus loyalty, referrals, and review tools without piling on multiple vendors, an integrated platform can be a more cost-efficient long-term choice. Later sections explain how combining retention features in one suite affects total cost of ownership.

Integrations & Ecosystem

Out-of-the-box integrations

• Smart Wishlist lists SendGrid and ShareThis among its integrations. SendGrid is commonly used for transactional and marketing emails, and ShareThis facilitates social sharing tracking.
• First Wish does not list any integrations in the provided data. That does not mean none exist, but merchants should confirm support for email providers, automation platforms, and analytics tools before installation.

Why integrations matter:

• Wishlist interactions are high-value signals for segmentation and email flows (e.g., “Items added to wishlist” → cart recovery or back-in-stock alerts).
• Quick integration into email platforms like Klaviyo or Omnisend saves development work.

Recommendation:

• If a merchant relies on a particular email tool or a headless architecture, prefer the app with clear integration support or open APIs. Smart Wishlist’s API approach is favorable for bespoke integrations.

Platform compatibility

Smart Wishlist lists compatibility with standard Shopify plug points and claims a lightweight approach that preserves theme integrity. First Wish’s cross-device sync suggests server-side support for logged-in user mapping, but confirm compatibility for:

• Shopify Plus features
• Checkout extensibility
• Headless storefronts

For merchants on Shopify Plus or headless setups, confirm support for the desired architecture before implementation.

Support & Trust Signals

User reviews and ratings

• Smart Wishlist: 81 reviews with a 3.6 rating. A larger number of reviews indicates broader adoption and more varied merchant feedback. The 3.6 average suggests a mix of satisfied customers and areas for improvement; read the reviews to identify common themes (e.g., reliability, feature gaps, or support quality).
• First Wish: 1 review with a 1.0 rating. That indicates a very small user base and limited public feedback. A single low score is an early warning sign to proceed with caution; test thoroughly or request references.

Why this matters:

• A broader review sample offers more reliable signals about real-world performance and vendor responsiveness.
• Lower ratings can result from multiple causes: bugs, UX friction, poor documentation, or unmet expectations. Look for patterns in the reviews rather than single comments.

Developer reputation and responsiveness

• Webmarked (Smart Wishlist) and Vellir (First Wish) should be evaluated for responsiveness to merchant questions, release cadence, and willingness to customize or troubleshoot. App listing comments and support response times provide real-world cues.

Support expectations:

• Confirm support channels (email, live chat, in-app messaging).
• Identify service level expectations for critical events (Black Friday, product launches).
• Request a support SLA if the wishlist is tied to conversion-critical flows.

Implementation, Migration, and Risk Management

Installation and setup complexity

Smart Wishlist markets “super-easy to setup with no coding required.” This matters for merchants without development resources who need a fast rollout.

First Wish indicates “easy to install” as well, but features like boards and dashboard customizations may require additional configuration.

Checklist before install:

• Back up the live theme or test on a duplicate theme.
• Confirm whether the app uses theme app blocks (recommended) or injects code into theme files (riskier).
• Validate mobile responsiveness and visual fit with the storefront.

Uninstall and cleanup

Smart Wishlist explicitly states it is lightweight and won’t break themes upon uninstall. That’s an important claim; merchants should still:

• Check for residual snippet files in theme templates after uninstall.
• Test page speed and UI after removal.

First Wish does not state uninstall behavior. Merchants should ask support for a documented uninstall process and test on a staging environment.

Data export and ownership

Wishlist data can be valuable for personalization and re-engagement. Confirm whether either app:

• Provides exports (CSV/JSON) of wishlist events and customer associations.
• Offers webhooks or API endpoints to stream events to email platforms and analytics tools.
• Persists data after uninstall or provides export tools before removal.

Smart Wishlist’s API claims suggest better capabilities for merchant-controlled data flows.

Practical Merchant Use Cases and Recommendations

Below are common merchant needs with guidance on which app fits better.

• Stores that need a simple wishlist with minimal overhead:
  • Smart Wishlist is the straightforward choice due to low price and guest-friendly saving.
• Shops that want curated boards for events and social sharing:
  • First Wish focuses on boards and curated lists; evaluate the dashboard and sharing UX during trial.
• Merchants that plan to use wishlist signals in marketing automation:
  • Smart Wishlist’s API support is an advantage; validate specific integrations or webhooks needed.
• High-volume stores or omnichannel retailers:
  • Review First Wish’s add limits against peak season forecasts; consider an integrated solution that scales without many separate usage metrics.
• Teams that lack developer bandwidth and want a single partner for retention:
  • Consider an integrated retention platform that combines wishlist with loyalty, referrals, and reviews to avoid multiple contracts and fractured data.

Reliability, Performance, and Scalability

Handling high traffic and seasonal spikes

Merchants should confirm the app’s behavior under peak loads. Questions to ask the vendor:

• How does the app handle concurrent saves during flash sales?
• Is there rate limiting on API endpoints?
• Are wishlist assets served from edge/CDNs to minimize latency?

Smart Wishlist’s emphasis on a lightweight payload suggests better initial performance. First Wish’s tiered pricing based on add counts requires modeling to ensure service continuity when limits are exceeded.

Monitoring and error handling

Ask vendors how they surface errors and what monitoring exists for failed saves or syncs. For mission-critical features, seek:

• Error logs accessible by merchants
• Retry strategies for failed events
• Support escalation paths

Migration and Coexistence

If migrating from one wishlist app to another, plan for:

• Exporting wishlists and mapping customers (anonymous IDs vs. logged-in accounts).
• Communicating potential behavior changes to customers (e.g., loss of saved items if not migrated cleanly).
• Phasing the rollout: enable the new wishlist on a small percentage of traffic first to confirm behavior.

If using a wishlist alongside other tools, avoid overlapping features that lead to inconsistent messaging (e.g., two systems sending wishlist reminder emails). Consolidation reduces friction — a point revisited in the next section.

Security and Compliance Considerations

Wishlist implementations often involve storing product IDs and, for logged-in users, customer identifiers. Verify:

• GDPR and CCPA compliance posture
• Data retention policies and deletion workflows
• Whether third-party integrations pass data to external analytics or advertising platforms

For merchants subject to strict privacy requirements, prefer vendors that provide clear documentation and controls for data export and deletion.

Pricing Modeling Example

Merchants should calculate expected incremental revenue that can be attributed to wishlist engagement and compare against subscription cost. Key metrics to estimate:

• Wishlist-to-purchase conversion rate
• Average order value of wishlist-driven orders
• Monthly wishlist-add volume

Given First Wish’s usage caps, model the likelihood that spikes (holiday campaigns, influencer mentions) push the store into higher tiers. Smart Wishlist’s flat $4.99 fee simplifies forecasting.

The Alternative: Solving App Fatigue with an All-in-One Platform

What is app fatigue?

App fatigue occurs when merchants accumulate multiple single-purpose apps to solve adjacent retention problems. Each app introduces:

• Separate billing lines
• Fragmented customer data
• Multiple theme modifications and potential conflicts
• More vendor relationships to manage

The cumulative cost — in money and operations — can outweigh the benefits of picking specialized best-of-breed tools, especially for stores with limited engineering resources.

The case for consolidation

Consolidating wishlist, loyalty, referrals, and reviews into a single platform reduces friction in three ways:

• Unified customer profiles: wishlist actions, reward points, and referral activity live in the same dataset, enabling accurate segmentation.
• Fewer theme edits and lower runtime overhead: one vetted integration reduces theme churn and performance overhead.
• Simplified vendor management: single billing and one support relationship simplify troubleshooting and strategic planning.

This is the principle behind a “More Growth, Less Stack” approach: prioritize integrated retention outcomes rather than picking point solutions for each micro-problem.

Growave as an integrated retention suite

Growave combines loyalty, referrals, reviews, and wishlist in a single platform. For merchants evaluating Smart Wishlist or First Wish, Growave shifts the selection from “which wishlist app?” to “what retention strategy is needed?” Key platform strengths:

• Loyalty and rewards to increase repeat purchase frequency
• Referrals that turn wishlists into referral triggers
• Reviews & UGC capture to improve conversion across product pages
• Wishlist functionality that integrates directly with loyalty and email workflows

Merchants can compare plans and pricing to assess total cost of ownership and ROI using a low-friction plan overview; consider starting by reviewing options to consolidate retention features and reduce tool sprawl: consolidate retention features.

Growave supports advanced enterprise needs with solutions for high-growth Plus brands, while also providing granular loyalty mechanics for smaller stores. For teams that prioritize social proof, Growave allows merchants to collect and showcase authentic reviews alongside wishlist-driven campaigns.

Merchants considering an integrated path should also evaluate loyalty mechanics specifically designed to turn wishlist saves into repeat purchases. Growave provides loyalty and rewards that drive repeat purchases and can convert wishlist intent into point-earning activities and targeted incentives.

How consolidation improves key retention metrics

• Higher retention (repeat purchase rate): Reward actions tied to wishlist behavior (e.g., points for creating lists, bonus for purchases from wishlist items) increase lifetime value.
• Improved conversion rate: Reviews and UGC displayed alongside wishlist items reduce uncertainty when wishlists are shared and viewed by gift buyers.
• Lower churn of vendor contracts and simpler reconciliation: One contract, one integration, fewer overlapping emails or duplicate messaging.

For merchants ready to test an integrated solution, a hands-on walkthrough is useful. Book a personalized session to see how an integrated retention stack maps to business goals and workflows. Book a personalized demo to see how an integrated retention stack improves retention.

Where a single-purpose wishlist still makes sense

Consolidation is not always the immediate answer. There are scenarios where a low-cost or lightweight wishlist remains the right choice:

• Very small catalogs with minimal wishlisting needs.
• Temporary campaigns where the goal is only to capture short-term product interest.
• Stores with complex existing loyalty/review systems that cannot be migrated quickly.

However, when the merchant’s roadmap includes loyalty, referrals, and reviews — or when the merchant wants to reduce manual integration work — the integrated approach tends to be a better long-term value for money.

How to evaluate Growave versus single-purpose wishlist apps

When comparing Growave to Smart Wishlist or First Wish, evaluate the following:

• Feature breadth vs. depth: Growave provides multiple retention features; single-purpose apps may offer deeper niche functionality but require extra integrations to match a combined feature set.
• Cost of ownership: Calculate combined monthly costs of wishlist + loyalty + reviews + referrals vs. Growave plans. Review plan options and pick the right tier from the plan comparison to reduce total app count: compare plans and pricing.
• Data portability and integrations: Growave offers integrations with common marketing and customer service tools, making it easier to surface wishlist behavior in email flows and support queries.
• Scalability: For merchants planning to scale to Shopify Plus, confirm platform support and enterprise features: solutions for high-growth Plus brands.

For merchants assessing whether to migrate, read customer stories for real-world examples of consolidation benefits and strategy: customer stories from brands scaling retention.

Migration Checklist for Moving from a Single Wishlist App to an Integrated Suite

• Inventory current wishlist behavior and volume (monthly adds, share frequency).
• Export wishlist data from the existing app (ask vendor for CSV/API export if needed).
• Map anonymous saves to customers where possible to preserve history.
• Configure loyalty and reward triggers that interact with wishlist actions (e.g., points for purchases originating from wishlist).
• Set up review capture for product pages that are frequently wishlisted.
• Test email flows and automation to avoid duplicate messaging.
• Phase rollback plan: keep previous app on a staging theme until verified production is clean.

Implementation Tips and Best Practices

• Prioritize guest wishlist behavior: frictionless saving is a powerful signal. If moving to a new platform, ensure guest saves remain supported.
• Use wishlist events to personalize cart recovery — wishlist saves can trigger tailored messages rather than generic abandoned cart emails.
• Turn wishlists into purchase drivers by offering limited-time incentives (consider loyalty points or coupons) to convert intent into action.
• Monitor key metrics post-implementation: wishlist-to-order conversion, AOV on wishlist-driven orders, and incremental revenue from wishlists.

Conclusion

For merchants choosing between Smart Wishlist and First Wish ‑ Wishlist & Boards, the decision comes down to use case and scale. Smart Wishlist is an excellent fit for merchants who need a simple, reliable, and low-cost wishlist that supports guest saving and easy sharing. First Wish offers curated boards and admin reporting that can help stores focused on organized gift lists and social sharing, but limited reviews and a small public footprint suggest merchants should test thoroughly before committing.

If the business roadmap includes loyalty programs, referrals, review collection, and wishlist-driven personalization, investing in a single integrated platform reduces technical complexity and offers better long-term value for money. Growave’s “More Growth, Less Stack” approach combines wishlist with loyalty and review functionality so merchants can stop stitching together point solutions and start optimizing retention holistically. Compare plans and pricing to see how consolidation affects total cost and operational overhead: consolidate retention features.

Start a 14-day free trial of Growave to evaluate whether an integrated retention suite reduces tool sprawl and accelerates repeat purchases. Start a 14-day free trial of Growave and consolidate retention features

FAQ

• How do Smart Wishlist and First Wish differ in terms of guest user support?
  • Smart Wishlist emphasizes one-click saving for guests and logged-in users, lowering friction for casual browsers. First Wish supports anonymous saves but highlights the benefits of logged-in customers for cross-device sync and boards.
• Which app offers better analytics out of the box?
  • First Wish advertises an admin dashboard with activity reports and best-performing products. Smart Wishlist lists APIs for extracting data but does not emphasize native analytics. Merchants seeking built-in reporting may prefer First Wish, while those wanting data ownership and custom reporting may prefer Smart Wishlist’s API approach.
• How should a merchant decide between installing a single wishlist app or a combined retention platform?
  • Decision factors include roadmap (loyalty, referrals, reviews), engineering resources, expected wishlist volume, and desire to avoid multiple vendor relationships. If the merchant plans to expand retention efforts, an integrated platform typically delivers better value for money over time.
• How does an all-in-one platform compare to specialized apps when it comes to wishlist functionality?
  • An all-in-one platform trades the potential depth of a niche tool for the operational and data advantages of consolidation. It enables loyalty and reward mechanics to act on wishlist behavior directly and reduces the number of integrations to maintain. Specialized apps may offer deeper niche features, but the combined complexity and cost of several single-purpose apps can outweigh those benefits.