Xoom vs Wise

Both Wise and Xoom are large, duly licensed money transfer platforms that you can most certainly trust to deliver your money from A to B.

A subsidiary of PayPal, Xoom is one of the most popular transfer platforms globally and is available in an impressive number of countries and currencies. Furthermore, Xoom has around five million active users and has been operating since 2001, giving it a long service track record.

Similarly, Wise is also a large company regulated in the UK and all countries in which it operates. However, Wise is quite a bit larger than Xoom and boasts around 10 million customers while handling about 18 times more money transfer volume every year than Xoom.

Regarding pricing transparency, we found Wise to be far more open and clear about their pricing than Xoom. Wise makes all its fees and costs known upfront on the sending page, whereas Xoom doesn't disclose the (rather large) exchange rate margin it levies on all currency conversions.

When it comes to the ease of sending money, Wise without a doubt has the edge over Xoom. (However, it's worth strongly reiterating that these two platforms are quite different and specialize in slightly different pay-out markets.)

For example, we tested both platforms against the same set of user experience criteria, and we thought that Wise's platform provided a better all-round experience. Wise's website and mobile app — which was fast, user-friendly, and simple to use — particularly impressed us with its clean user experience and helpful prompts and tips. We found the website to be approachable, and we liked the fact that it avoided complicated phrases and money transfer jargon.

On the other hand, we found Xoom's web and mobile interface to be slightly more clunky — although still relatively clear and easy to understand. What we didn't like in particular about Xoom was that the signup process took us quite a lot of time (although sending money itself was almost as fast and easy as Wise). We also weren't impressed with the fact that around 75% of Xoom's fees are in the exchange rate — something that's not communicated clearly on the sending page.

One major difference between the platforms is in the pay-out: Wise only transfers money to bank accounts, whereas Xoom transfers money to bank accounts and to agent locations for cash pickup.

Pricing is the area in which Wise truly dominates over Xoom. —

This is because Wise charges no exchange rate margin (exchanging money at the mid-market rate) and makes its money by adding a small variable or fixed fee onto every transfer. These fees are transparent and can be seen on the sending page or on Wise's dedicated fees calculator.

On the other hand, Xoom charges a standard exchange rate margin and a rather hefty variable fee in addition. As a result, this means that Xoom is almost always the more expensive option.

For example, suppose you were sending a $500 transfer to a friend in Canada from the USA. At the time of writing, a direct bank payment via Wise would cost $3.66 in total fees, while a bank transfer with Xoom would cost $4.99 plus an exchange rate that's 3.92% worse than the mid‑market rate. In the end, your friend would receive $630 Canadians if the transfer were made with Wise and $603 Canadians with Xoom. That's a nearly 3% difference in the amount received!

Take a look at the table below to get a better picture of how this works:

Based on how customers review Wise and Xoom, it's pretty clear that both platforms impress their users.

Xoom is very popular with users, earning a 4.1- out of five-star rating on Trustpilot with many positive reviews. More impressive still is Wise, which has received overwhelmingly positive reviews on Trustpilot, with around 85% of 116 thousand customers rating the service five out of five stars.

While we think Wise slightly outdoes Xoom in this area, it's fair to say that both platforms deliver on their promises and satisfy their users.