AP-10 APPS
Business phone app for iOS and Android: the best small business phone number app
A business phone app adds a second, work-only number to the phone you already carry, with no second SIM and no second device. The Phoner business phone number app runs on iOS, Android, desktop, and web, keeps work calls separate from personal ones, and starts at $15 per user per month.
Work calls announce themselves as work, your personal number stays private, and closing time actually closes: after hours, business calls go to a voicemail that arrives as text instead of ringing at dinner.
ON EVERY PLAN · FROM $15/USER/MO
What a second work number on your phone changes
01
Your personal number stays yours
Customers see and save the business number. Yard signs, invoices, and late-night ideas stop pointing at your personal cell.
02
Work has closing hours
Business hours live on the business line. After 6, calls route to voicemail to text; at 8 am they ring again. Your phone, your rules.
03
Every device, one line
Start a call at the desk, finish it on the sidewalk. Calls, texts, and voicemails stay in sync across iOS, Android, desktop, and web.
04
The whole team, same app
Each teammate gets the app with their own line plus the shared ones. Ring groups ring apps, not desk hardware.
How to set up the Phoner app
Install and sign in
Get the iOS or Android app and sign in; your lines are already there. Desktop and web work the same way.
Pick or port your number
Choose a new local or toll-free number in about 5 minutes, or port the one on your business cards.
Set your hours
Decide when the business line rings and where it goes when you are off. Then put the phone back in your pocket.
Want the whole picture? See the cloud phone system, explained walkthrough from number to first call.
One app, the whole phone system
The app is the handset for everything else: it is where call routing delivers calls, where business text messaging threads live, and where voicemail to text transcripts land about 30 seconds after a missed call.
A phone system for remote teams can skip desk phones entirely: everyone answers the same numbers from wherever they are, and the caller hears one company. Comparing options first? Our ranked list of the best second phone number apps is honest about when a lighter app is enough.
An app is the handset, not the whole purchase. What you are actually buying is business phone service, and the app is how you answer it. That matters when you compare an app-only product against a full system: a $5 second-number app cannot ring four people at once or answer with a menu at 7 pm. If you are choosing between the two, the small business phone system page lays out where the line falls.
Why the business line moved into an app
Three numbers from primary sources rather than vendor blogs, each of which explains why the phone system stopped being a box on a wall.
91%
Share of US adults who own a smartphone, from a Pew Research Center survey of 5,022 adults conducted February 5 to June 18, 2025. Another 98 percent own a cellphone of some kind, so the hardware a business phone app needs is already paid for and already in the pocket of everyone you would hire.
83.7%
Share of the 53 million US business wireline voice connections that were already interconnected VoIP rather than traditional switched lines in June 2025, while switched business lines fell at a 17.9 percent annual rate. The migration inside business telephony is close to finished.
Your number
Under FCC local number portability rules you can keep your telephone number when you change providers in the same area, and a provider cannot refuse to release it because you still owe money on the account. The number you build on an app is yours, not the app's.
Source: FCC, Keeping Your Telephone Number When Changing Service Providers
Business phone apps compared: entry pricing and who each one suits
Entry prices taken from each vendor's own published pricing page in July and August 2026. The column people skip is the middle one. An app billed per account costs the same whether one person or six use it, while an app billed per user multiplies with every hire, and that single difference usually matters more than any feature on the page.
| App | Entry price | Billed by | Who it actually suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phoner | $15 per user per month, yearly | User | A team of two to twenty sharing one published number |
| Google Voice Starter | $10 per month standalone, one user | User | One person who wants the cheapest respectable line |
| Grasshopper Solo | $14 per month, flat | Account | One person who wants one number and no per-seat math |
| Quo (formerly OpenPhone) | $15 per user per month, yearly | User | Sales teams that work out of a shared message inbox |
| Dialpad | $15 per user per month, yearly | User | Teams who want AI transcription of every call first |
| Nextiva | $15 per user per month, yearly | User | Businesses buying phone, chat, and support in one contract |
| Phone.com Basic | $15 per user per month, yearly | User | Mixed teams: it assigns a different plan to each user |
| RingCentral | $20 per user per month yearly, $30 monthly | User | Larger teams needing video and heavy admin controls |
| Ooma Office | $19.95 per user per month | User | Buyers who want desk phones alongside the app |
Swipe sideways for the full table
PHONER PRICES ARE OUR PUBLISHED LIST PRICES · COMPETITOR ENTRY PRICING VERIFIED JULY AND AUGUST 2026 FROM EACH VENDOR'S PUBLISHED PAGE AND CHANGES OFTEN · RE-VERIFY BEFORE YOU BUY
What a business phone app will not do for you
Four honest limits. Each one has sent a buyer somewhere else, and you should know them before you download anything rather than in week three.
Your phone can silence it, and the app cannot stop that
Incoming calls arrive as a push notification, so anything that throttles background activity throttles your business line. Battery savers, Focus modes, and aggressive Android power management are the usual culprits. Exempt the app during setup, keep notifications on, and test it by calling yourself from another phone before you print the number on anything.
No data connection, no call, and 911 uses the address you gave us
The app needs Wi-Fi or cellular data. In a basement, on a plane, or during an outage it will not ring, though you can point the number at a cell number so calls reroute instead of vanishing. Emergency calls are routed by the service address you register, not your live location, so keep it current and dial 911 from your carrier line when you can.
A free second-number app is genuinely enough for some people
If you are one person who wants a second number for a side business and nothing else, Google Voice or an ad-supported app will do the job and cost nothing. We are not going to pretend otherwise. Paid service starts to earn its money at the point a second person has to answer the same line, or the number has to survive that person quitting.
It is a phone system, not a call center, and texting needs registration
You get ring groups, a phone menu, business hours, recording, and voicemail to text. You do not get predictive dialing, workforce management, or supervisor dashboards. And before your business number can text US customers reliably, carriers require A2P 10DLC registration, which we file for you but which takes a few days.
Mobile app: common questions
No. The app carries the business number over your data connection or Wi-Fi. One device, two numbers, and the business one has its own ring, hours, and voicemail.
Yes. The iOS, Android, desktop, and web apps stay in sync, so a call started on the laptop can move to the phone mid-conversation.
The apps are included in every plan. Starter is $15 per user per month billed yearly ($19 monthly) and comes with a local number, unlimited US and Canada calling, and voicemail to text.
Install the app, sign in, and choose a local or toll-free number, which takes about five minutes. The business number then rings on the phone you already own, alongside your personal number, with its own ringtone and voicemail. There is no SIM to swap and nothing to install by the carrier.
The best business phone app for a small team is one that carries a shared company number rather than a personal second line. Look for ring groups, business hours, a phone menu, and voicemail to text. Lightweight second-number apps are cheaper but stop at one person answering one number.
Yes. That is the main difference between a business phone app and a second-number app. The company number rings every assigned teammate at once, or in an order you set, and whoever picks up first takes it. Everyone answers from their own device, and missed calls go to one shared voicemail.
No. Calls travel over your data connection or Wi-Fi rather than your carrier plan, so they do not consume plan minutes. A call uses under 100 Kbps in each direction, which is a small fraction of typical mobile data use. Your carrier bill and your phone service stay separate.
It stays with the company. Because the number lives in your account rather than on their SIM, you remove their access and reassign the line in a click. The call history and voicemail stay too. A number on someone's personal cell walks out the door with them.
Features that work this line
RT-04 ROUTING
Call routing
Ring groups, hours rules, and failover so no call dies in one voicemail.
Call routingTX-05 TEXTING
Business texting
SMS and MMS from your business number, with a shared team inbox.
Business text messagingVM-02 VOICEMAIL
Voicemail to text
Every voicemail transcribed in about 30 seconds, pushed to app and email.
Voicemail to textAP-10 APPS · Your line is open
Carry the office line, not the office
Apps on every plan from $15 per user per month. Number live in about 5 minutes.