Money instead of a gift
With money instead of a gift, guests send you the amount directly — ideal for creators, running lists and wishes you haven’t pinned down yet.
Money instead of a gift lets guests send you what a wish costs, rather than buying the product themselves. What you then do with the money is up to you.
How it works
Normally a guest sees a product on your wishlist and buys it in the shop. With money instead of a gift that changes:
- guests see the wish, with its picture and price, as inspiration
- rather than buying it, they press Contribute money
- they send you the amount, or part of it, directly
- the money reaches your account and you buy it yourself — or spend it on something else
Put simply: your wishlist becomes a source of gift inspiration. Guests give you money rather than products.
Who it’s for
Creators
Running a list for your fans? With money instead of a gift they don’t have to buy and ship anything — they just send the amount.
Wishes you haven’t decided on
Want a laptop but not sure which one? Guests contribute toward the amount and you buy exactly the model you want.
Running lists
Lists that stay open indefinitely, like creator pages, work particularly well this way. Guests can contribute again and again, within the hourly limits further down this page.
Setting it up
There are two ways in, depending on the list, and they have different requirements.
On a creator list
Nothing to switch. Money instead of a gift is on permanently for the whole list and the setting is locked — a creator list exists for exactly this.
It works with whatever payment method you use — Stripe, PayPal, or none yet. A creator page is money-only by design, so nothing has to be switched on and no payment method is required for the setting itself. How to set up Stripe →
On every other list
There’s no whole-list switch in the settings. You decide per wish instead: when you add or edit one, the guest-contribution setting says whether guests reserve that wish, send money for it, or pick either. So a birthday list can have one expensive wish collecting money while everything else gets reserved and bought.
That per-wish route doesn’t need Stripe. It works with PayPal too, and even with no payment method at all — guests then promise a contribution and you collect the money yourself.
What changes for guests
Without it, guests see a product, reserve it, buy it in the shop and hand it to you.
With it, guests see the product as inspiration and send you the amount instead.
| Standard | Money instead of a gift | |
|---|---|---|
| What the guest does | Reserves it, buys it | Sends you the amount |
| Button | Reserve gift | Contribute money |
| Money goes | Guest → shop | Guest → straight to you |
| Who buys the product | The guest | You |
Running lists vs. event lists
The feature behaves slightly differently depending on the list.
Event lists (birthday, wedding and the rest)
- Guests can contribute up to the wish’s target: the amount you set, our frozen conversion when the shop price is in another currency, and otherwise the product’s price. If a foreign price cannot be converted reliably, the wish takes no money until you set a target yourself
- Once that’s reached and the money is confirmed, the wish is marked Gifted with Stripe, or Funded with PayPal or no online payment. While contributions are only pledged, the card shows them as still pending
- Further contributions need you to raise the wish’s target first. On a group fund that’s the target amount; on a product wish without its own target it’s the price. A product wish that does have its own target can’t be changed once the first contributions are in. More about group funds →
Running lists (creator pages)
- Guests can contribute again and again, but not without limit: ten an hour without an account. Signed in it is thirty an hour by PayPal or offline, while a card checkout stays at ten an hour either way and counts separately
- Wishes are never marked done — they stay open
- Ideal if you want to keep receiving gifts indefinitely
Alongside group funds
The two complement each other. A group fund is for one big shared gift with a target, like a trip. Money instead of a gift turns individual product wishes into money gifts.
You can have both on the same list — group funds for the big targets, product wishes as inspiration for money.
Security
- The money goes straight to you — into your Stripe account, your PayPal, or however you agreed
- Wishlist.de never has access to it
- A card payment is handled encrypted by Stripe; PayPal runs in PayPal, and an offline payment never touches us at all
- We never see bank details or card numbers — we store the amount, the status and, on a Stripe payment, the transaction reference
Common questions
Can guests send part of the amount?
Yes. Guests choose how much they give — up to whatever is still missing on an ordinary wish, or up to 2,000 per payment on a creator page — and several people can contribute to the same wish. A single payment through Stripe is capped at 10,000, so a larger sum has to come in more than one go.
What happens to my existing product wishes?
Nothing is lost. Your products stay visible as inspiration — only the way guests contribute changes.
Can I switch the feature off again?
On a creator list, no — it’s locked on, and the API rejects an attempt to unset it. On every other list there’s nothing whole-list to switch off in the settings: you change the guest-contribution setting on the individual wish, and that wish goes back to being reserved and bought.
Do guests still see the product link?
It depends on the wish. If guests may still reserve it, yes. On a wish set to money only, the shop link is hidden from them on purpose, so nobody buys it elsewhere while you are collecting for it — you keep seeing it yourself.
Do I have to buy the product?
No. The money is yours to use as you like. The products on your list are inspiration, not an obligation.