Waitlists for 2026: Are they still valuable or just vanity figures?

A waitlist used to mean a demonstration of demand two years back. However, seeing products with 5,000 sign-ups and an initial activation rate of less than 4% shows how the list only meant curiosity and not intention.

With my most recent product, I tried to change things around. I never went with the usual form but rather had just one question during signup: What are you currently using? The responses helped me more than knowing the count ever would. Three respondents mentioned the same spreadsheet which ended up being our very first feature for imports.

Has there been a waitlist before and has the count made any difference? Have you used the quality of responses instead? Any product launch experience without the waitlist would be great as well.