Wishlist Member vs. Restrict Content Pro – Full Comparison

Don’t know which will do a better job at managing your membership site properly and provide you with the flow and structure you need?

In this post we give you a full comparison of the two plugins, including core important membership settings and features.

You can navigate through the different settings according to your needs to find what you are looking for faster:

Core Membership Features

Both Wishlist Member and Restrict Content Pro offer the following membership features:

• Creating unlimited membership levels
• Simple interface to manage your members, from viewing members’ status (active/ expired/ cancelled etc.), assigned membership levels etc. to editing members’ details
• Setting the subscription length for each membership level
• Export important members’ information in CSV file

Membership features allowed in Wishlist Member only:

• Social login – Using a plugin called WLM Social
• Login redirection
• Creating bundles – You can create simple bundles using Wishlist’s sequential upgrade, or use Wishlist Bundles plugin to create more complex and advanced bundles to maximize your revenues)

Protection Settings

Both Wishlist Member and Restrict Content Pro allow you to determine the following protection settings:

• Total content protection
• Free and paid memberships
• Display “teaser” content to non-members (content before the “< !–more– >” tag)

Some important protection settings which are currently available in Wishlist only are:

• Ability to secure your RSS feed so members will consume content directly from their favorite RSS reader
• Allow content dripping which is a very important feature for many membership sites owners. Content dripping is available in Wishlist Member using Wishlist Content Scheduler plugin developed by the Wishlist Member team themselves
• Sell posts individually using pay-per-post feature

Pay-per-view is not available in both Wishlist Member and Restrict Content Pro.

Payment Models

With both Wishlist and Restrict Content Pro you can offer trial periods and discount coupons (In order to offer coupons using Wishlist you will need to use Wishlist Coupon plugin).

Upsells and one-time offers can be done in Wishlist only, but it depends on the shopping cart you are using.

Shopping Carts Integration

Wishlist Member plugin offers integrations with the following shopping carts:

• PayPal Standard
• PayPal Pro
• ClickBank
• InfusionSoft
• Authorize.net
• Stripe
• Premium Web Cart
• JVZoo
• 2CheckOut
• SamCart
• eWay
• 1ShoppingCart
• Cydec
• Pin Payments
• Recurly
• Red Oak Cart
• Sam Cart
• Ultra Cart

Another important feature you can achieve with Wishlist Member is allowing automatic registration using a 3rd-party plugin developed by our company HappyPlugins called Wishlist Auto Registration.

Restrict Content Pro offers integrations with the following shopping carts:

• PayPal Standard (built-in)
• PayPal Pro & PayPal Express
• Stripe
• Braintree (add-on) – Braintree payment gateway is not available in Wishlist Member

Autoresopnders Integration

Wishlist Member is fully integrated with the following autoresponder services, including:

• GetResponse
• Aweber
• MailChimp
• Constant Contact
• iContact
• OntraPort
• Mad Mimi
• Inspire Email Marketer
• InfusionSoft
• MaroPost
• AutoResponse Plus
• arpReach
• Active Campaign

Restrict Content Pro allows you to purchase seprate add-ons to integrate the following autoresponders:

• MailChimp
• Camapign Monitor
• MailPoet (Wysija)

Forums Integration

Wishlist Member integrates with SimplePress, Vanilla forums and bbPress (bbPress – possible using Wishlist bbPress protection plugin).

You can read more about the forums that integrate with Wishlist in our Wishlist Member Tips Series – Tip #18: Which Forums Integrate with Wishlist Member? (you need to be logged-in to the site to read the tip).

Restrict Content Pro integrates with bbPress and BuddyPress.

Neither integrate with Mingle forum.

eCommerce Platforms Integration

Wishlist Member integrates with one of the most popular eCommerce platforms – WooCommerce. You can enhance your Wishlist Member WooCommerce integration using Wishlist Member WooCommerce Plus plugin).

Both Wishlist and Restrict Content Pro does not integrate with Easy Digital Downloads (EDD). An integration plugin for integrating Wishlist Member and Easy Digital Downloads will be released soon and will allow you to sell membership products in your online store.

If you are looking for a good solution for Easy Digital Downloads, we recommend from our experience to use Content Restriction plugin, as both EDD and Content Restriction plugins were developed by the same company and they work seamlessly.

Affiliate Platforms Integration

Wishlist Member integrates with the most popular affiliate platforms, including:

• iDevAffiliate
• Affiliate Royale
• AffiliateWP

Restrict Content Pro integrates with AffiliateWP only, however, we found it to be the best affiliate plugin developed so far, and it is also developed by the same owners of Restrict Content Pro and Easy Digital Downloads plugins.

Compare between popular affiliate plugins here

Pricing

Wishlist Member is a paid membership plugin that is offered as a single license ($97) and unlimited licenses ($297), both include support and access to documentation and video tutorials.

You can also get access to premium content, the members’ forum, bonus materials, mini courses and more by registering to Wishlist’s online community – Wishlist Insider at $20 / month.

Restrict Content Pro offers 4 plans: Single license, 2-5 licenses, unlimited licenses or unlimited + extensions

The Bottom Line

Both plugins have good reputation, Wishlist Member is a very veteran membership plugin in the market and it includes more features than Restrict Content Pro on the one hand, however, behind Restrict Content Pro is the respectful Pippin Williamson, the brain behind Easy Digital Downloads eCommerce platform on the other hand.

The bottom line is that the best way to choose a membership plugin is to first make sure the plugin supports all the features and settings you need in order to build your membership site.

Other Comparisons

• Wishlist Member vs. Digital Access Pass
• Wishlist Member vs. MagicMembers
• Wishlist Member vs. MemberPress
• Wishlist Member vs. Paid Memberships Pro
• Wishlist Member vs. MemberMouse
• Wishlist Member vs. s2Member
• Wishlist Member vs. WP-Member

Useful Resources

• Popular Membership Plugins Comparison
• Wishlist Member Version 2.9 Review (Latest Version)
• Wishlist Member Official Site
• Restrict Content Pro Official Site

You May Find These Posts Interesting:

Wishlist Member vs. MemberMouse – Full Comparison

Wishlist Member vs. MemberPress – Full Comparison

Wishlist Member vs. MagicMembers – Full Comparison

Wishlist Member vs. Paid Memberships Pro – Full Comparison

Wishlist Member vs. s2Member – Full Comparison

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