New-listing alerts that arrive while the deal is still there

How it works

1. Search as usual on Facebook Marketplace or Kijiji, with whatever filters you want: a price range, a category, a location.
2. Open Sift from the toolbar and switch on Watch this search. The first time, Chrome asks whether Sift may show notifications.
3. Choose how often to check. Every 15, 30 or 60 minutes on Kijiji; every 30 or 60 on Facebook.
4. Sift takes a baseline. The listings already there don’t count as new, so you aren’t flooded on day one.
5. In the background, Sift checks the search on your schedule. It loads the page the way your browser would, spots listings it hasn’t seen in that search before, and runs each one through your filters.
6. You get one notification per check for the new listings that made it through, such as “3 new · dining table, Toronto (GTA)”, with the first two underneath: “CA$400 · Skogsta dining table”, “CA$275 · Oak trestle table, seats 6”.
7. Click the notification and the search opens in a new tab, with the new listings marked NEW.

The watch card in Sift’s popup shows how it’s going (“Checking every 30 min · checked 4 min ago”) with a count of what’s new. Sift’s settings list every watched search with when it was last checked, a Check now button, an on and off switch and a remove button.

Filtered before they reach you

Most alert tools forward everything that matches your keywords. Sift runs each new listing through the same filters you use while browsing, so you only hear about real candidates:

• Blocked words (“parts”, “wanted”, “message for price”) and required words.
• Distance from your home, so nothing past your line ever buzzes. See the distance filter.
• Dealers, sold and pending listings, and placeholder prices like CA$1.
• Sponsored listings and Kijiji Top Ads never count as new.

In a busy city, a broad search turns up far more new listings than you want to hear about. Blocked words and a distance limit cut that down to the few that fit, so a notification means something. See everything Sift can filter.

Quiet hours, and only when you’re at the computer

Alerts are meant to help, not nag. Set quiet hours (say 11 p.m. to 7 a.m.) and Sift doesn’t check at all during them. Checks also pause while you’re away from the computer or it’s locked, and pick up again when you’re back. Checks run one at a time, spaced out and capped each day, so Sift never hammers either site.

If Facebook ever asks you to sign in again, Sift pauses its Facebook checks and sends one notification telling you why, rather than retrying behind your back. Open Facebook, sign in as you normally would, and the alerts carry on.

How it compares with alert apps

There are plenty of paid alert services for Facebook Marketplace. They are built differently, and the differences matter more than the feature lists:

A cloud service has a real advantage if you want alerts on your phone while your laptop is shut. Sift’s advantages are that it costs nothing, needs no account and never handles your password. Whatever you choose, don’t give a third party your Facebook login: Meta’s terms say not to share it, and a login from an unfamiliar server is what Facebook’s security checks look for. For named tools side by side, see our dated comparison of Facebook Marketplace extensions.

Why native alerts fall short

Facebook’s own saved-search alerts work mainly in the phone app, Facebook decides when they arrive, and many people report them arriving late or not at all. Kijiji’s help page says its alerts come once a day, or daily or weekly in the app. Both are worth setting up on your phone, and our guides show how: Facebook Marketplace notifications and Kijiji alerts.

Privacy

Watching a search is the only time Sift makes a request of its own: it loads the search pages you chose to watch from facebook.com or kijiji.ca, with your browser’s own cookies, as if you opened them in a tab. With no watched searches, it makes no requests at all. What it has seen stays in your browser so it can tell new listings from old. There is no Sift server, no account and no analytics. The detail is in the privacy policy.

Where it works

Sift runs in Chrome, Edge and Brave on a computer, for Facebook Marketplace and Kijiji. Notifications appear on that computer. Coming soon to the Chrome Web Store.