How to add a wishlist to WordPress without WooCommerce

Search for “WordPress wishlist plugin” and nearly every result has the same requirement: WooCommerce. That’s fine if you run WooCommerce. But if you’ve built your store on FluentCart, those plugins won’t help you.

This guide explains why, and how to add a full wishlist to a store that doesn’t use WooCommerce.

Why most wishlist plugins need WooCommerce

A wishlist plugin has to know a lot about your store:

• what a product is, and where its price and image live,
• how variations like size and color are stored,
• how to add an item to the cart from the wishlist,
• when a product’s price or stock changes.

WooCommerce wishlist plugins get all of this from WooCommerce. FluentCart stores products, variations and orders in its own way, so a WooCommerce add-on simply can’t see your FluentCart products.

The option for FluentCart stores: GoWishCart

GoWishCart is a free wishlist plugin built only for FluentCart. It works with FluentCart products, variations, pricing and checkout directly. With it, you get:

• An add-to-wishlist button on product pages, and optionally on shop pages
• A wishlist page, created for you or placed anywhere with a shortcode
• Guest wishlists, so shoppers don’t need an account to save products
• Saved variations, so the exact size or color is remembered
• Price drop and back-in-stock emails for saved products
• FluentCRM triggers, if you use FluentCRM for email marketing

Setup in four steps

1. Install it. Go to Plugins → Add New, search for GoWishCart, then install and activate it. FluentCart must already be active.
2. Pick the wishlist page. Open Settings → GoWishCart. A page is created for you, or you can choose your own and add [gowishcart_wishlist] to it.
3. Place the button. Choose top or bottom of the product page, turn on the shop page button if you like, or use [gowishcart_wishlist_button] anywhere.
4. Test as a guest. Open a private browser window, save a product, and check it shows on the wishlist page.

The full walkthrough with screenshots of each option is in How to add a wishlist to your FluentCart store.

What if my store doesn’t use a cart plugin at all?

A wishlist only makes sense when there are products to buy. If you sell from a plain WordPress site with “buy” links to another platform, a bookmark-style plugin may be enough. But once you sell from WordPress itself, you need a cart plugin first, and then a wishlist that understands it.

If you’re choosing a cart plugin now, FluentCart is a lightweight option, and pairing it with GoWishCart gives you a wishlist from day one.

Next steps

• Read the complete guide to wishlists on FluentCart
• Moving an existing WooCommerce store? See what happens to your wishlist when you switch
• Download GoWishCart free from WordPress.org

GoWishCart Team

We build GoWishCart, the free wishlist plugin for FluentCart stores. Questions about this article? Ask in thesupport forum.