Net wishlists: additions minus deletions

Net wishlists are the wishlist additions a Steam game gained over a period minus the wishlist deletions over the same period. Purchases by wishlisters are counted separately, so net wishlists show how fast interest grows, while the outstanding balance also subtracts the wishlisters who bought.

Last reviewed · SteamStats team

Why net wishlists matter

Steam emails everyone who has a game on their wishlist when it releases, and again when a discount of 20.00% or more runs longer than 8 hours and covers the lowest-priced package. The size of the wishlist pool therefore decides how many people hear about the launch and the first discounts. Additions alone overstate that pool: a trailer, a festival or a streamer can bring a burst of adds that part of the audience removes days later. Net wishlists show what stayed.

Read day by day, net wishlists tell whether a campaign, a festival or an update moved the pool. Added up from the first day the store page went live, they give the balance that launch estimates and the wishlist conversion rate start from.

How they are counted

  1. Net wishlists = additions − deletions, over the same days.
  2. Outstanding balance = all additions so far − all deletions − purchases by wishlisters.
  3. Deletion rate = deletions ÷ additions, over the same days.

Valve's wishlist report tracks additions, purchases and deletions by the users who have the game on their wishlist. A wishlister who buys the game is a purchase, not a deletion. That is why a launch day with strong sales can show positive net wishlists while the outstanding balance falls: the buyers leave the pool without being counted as removals.

Valve dates wishlist purchases by the day in Pacific time. SteamStats counts each day from midnight in the organization's own time zone, so a daily net in SteamStats can differ slightly from a Pacific-time export of the same days, while the totals over a week or a month agree.

Example: a week of Pebblewick

Illustrative inputs for Pebblewick, the fictional demo game by Hollow Fern Games, in a week before launch with a trailer on Wednesday.

Pebblewick: wishlist additions, deletions and net for one week
DayAdditionsDeletionsNet
Mon42052+368
Tue45555+400
Wed1,310118+1,192
Thu980140+840
Fri61096+514
Sat47070+400
Sun44061+379
Week4,685592+4,093

The trailer tripled Wednesday's additions, and deletions rose on Thursday and Friday as some of the new wishlisters changed their minds. Over the week Pebblewick kept +4,093 net wishlists, and its deletion rate was 12.64%: 592 deletions ÷ 4,685 additions.

On launch day the same game adds 1,150 wishlists, loses 140 to deletions and sees 2,480 purchases by wishlisters. Net wishlists are +1,010, yet the outstanding balance changes by −1,470, because the buyers left the pool.

Where SteamStats shows it

The Wishlists view shows additions, deletions and net for every day over 7, 30 or 90 days, today's net by the hour against a usual day, and the deletion rate of the last seven days. A rate between 10.00% and 20.00% is marked Expected, above 20.00% Above and under 10.00% Below. The Removals alert says when deletions run high against additions. Wishlists need a connected Steamworks key and refresh every 60 min on Indie, Studio, and Publisher.

  • Wishlist deletes: Players removing a game from their Steam wishlist. A purchase is not a deletion: Steamworks counts wishlisters who buy the game separately.
  • Outstanding wishlists: The wishlists a game still holds: every addition so far minus deletions and purchases by wishlisters. Launch estimates start from this balance.
  • Wishlist conversion: The ratio of a game's sales to its wishlists at launch, most often first-week units divided by the outstanding wishlists on release day.
  • Coming Soon page: A Coming Soon page is a game's Steam store page published before release. Players can wishlist the game from it, and Valve reviews it before it goes public.

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