Google Voice toll-free numbers: Does Google Voice offer toll-free numbers?

Chances are you already know customers will only call your business if it’s affordable. Otherwise, they’ll go to a competitor that’s cheaper to contact. 

This problem may have led you to consider buying or porting a toll-free phone number to a Google Voice account.

But does Google Voice provide toll-free numbers? 

Google Voice doesn’t offer toll-free numbers. This means you can’t buy phone numbers with toll-free area codes, such as 855 and 888.

Plus, neither the free version nor their paid plan provides access to vanity numbers, and you can’t port in existing vanity phone numbers. 

The best you can do is use local numbers with their respective area codes, and you’ll only get one number per Google account — unless you subscribe to Google Voice for Google Workspace.

This is just the tip of the iceberg though for why Google Voice may not work for you.

This article dives into Google Voice’s major limitations, including its constraints on user limits, text messages, and more. And we’ll walk you through how to get a toll-free phone number with a better VoIP alternative.

Beyond no toll-free numbers, what other major limitations are there to Google Voice?

Google Voice looks like a reasonable VoIP phone provider on the surface. However, when you dig deeper into the features and integrations provided, you’ll realize how limited the platform is — from no Google Voice caller ID to limited integrations beyond Google products.

If you’re weighing the pros and cons of Google Voice, here’s a closer look at the service’s biggest business limitations. 👇

1. You need Google Workspace to use Google Voice’s paid business plan

Yep, you read that right. Google Voice for personal use might be free, but it comes with minimal features that don’t translate well to the business world. Their free plan doesn’t let you set business hours, have more than one number, or create ring group options to send incoming calls to different phone numbers. You might not even be able to sign up without an existing US phone number. Plus, you can’t make ​​unlimited calls in the US and Canada, which can get costly if your team frequently calls customers in North America.

Commercial users must pay a minimum of $6 per user per month alongside Google Voice’s pricing ($10 per user per month) to sign up for Google Voice’s paid business plan.

That’s a minimum of $16 per month — for just one user. 

2. You must upgrade if you have more than 10 users

Google Voice limits you to 10 users on their base plan unless you upgrade to their Standard plan ($20 per user per month). The downside? You might not need the extra features, but you will still end up paying double for every team member.

It doesn’t stop there. If you have over 50 team members, you’ll need to add licenses for each new user that cost $72 USD per license per year.

3. You won’t have access to external integrations

Google Voice’s basic plan does come with integrations, but only for Google Workspace products. Think Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Drive, Google Meet, and other Google apps. With Google Voice, you don’t have access to platforms like Zapier and Salesforce or anything that adds external functionality to your CRM or Slack workspaces. They also don’t have a Google Voice API available. This means you can’t set up automations or automatically log information between apps.

4. All communications are separated

Staying on the same page with all incoming calls and messages from your customers is key to providing a great customer experience. Unfortunately, Google Voice doesn’t make it easy to do this.

Text messages, calls, and voicemails are kept in separate inboxes, making it difficult to share between teams and know the a conversation’s history using Google Voice. Worst of all, reps can’t review communications before they’re sent out, which could lead to inefficiencies and duplicate efforts when handling incoming calls. 

5. There’s no shared team collaboration

To reiterate, no shared inboxes make it difficult to collaborate on external communications. You can forward calls in Google Voice, but you lack context for them and can’t review them later.

Call recordings are not available to bring other team members up to speed unless you upgrade to their Standard plan ($20 per user per month).

If you’re looking for a way to collaborate on phone calls with multiple members across teams, Google Voice doesn’t offer a solution out of the box. 

6. You face country-related limitations

If you have many clients overseas or live outside the US, Google Voice may be hard to integrate with your daily workflow. For example, Google Voice for personal use isn’t available outside the US. 

Google Voice for business is available outside the US, but only in certain countries:

• Belgium
• Canada
• Denmark
• France
• Germany
• Ireland
• Italy
• Netherlands
• Portugal
• Spain
• Sweden
• Switzerland
• UK
• US (but not US territories)

Keep in mind that unlimited calling and texting are only available to users in the US. Plus, free calling to Canada is only for phone calls made within the United States, which isn’t ideal if you aren’t based there and serve a lot of Canadian customers.

7. You don’t have any way to save time texting

Since phone automations can save an enormous amount of time and resources, they aren’t just a frilly extra; they’re essential to business growth.

But Google Voice doesn’t offer this, except for a very basic IVR (aka Google Voice auto-attendant) function. If your team needs to send similar text messages repeatedly, you won’t be able to save those as snippets in Google Voice. Auto-replies through Google Voice also aren’t possible if you want to set expectations on incoming text messages that your team is out for the day or temporarily busy. Other automated touchpoints via text aren’t supported at all.

You also can’t schedule texts to send them during your customers’ business hours, making it difficult to stay compliant with the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and risking lawsuits or hefty fines.

8. Sending business text messages to multiple recipients is not supported

Google Voice’s support for group messages and bulk texting is extremely limited. Users can only text in groups of up to seven people and only with a human touch (automation is strongly discouraged). Attempting to message more people than this at once could result in a suspension or ban from Google Voice.

Any larger-scale/mass text messaging isn’t available through Google Voice. 

9. Google Voice doesn’t have a desktop app

If you want to easily toggle to an app to take incoming calls, you should know that Google Voice doesn’t have a dedicated computer app. Instead, you must use the current version of one of these for texting and calling from a browser with Google Voice:

• Chrome
• Microsoft Edge
• Mozilla Firefox (Windows and Mac)
• Safari

This means your team might waste time trying to find the correct tab and take longer to solve customers’ issues.

10. Ring groups aren’t available on the base plan

For the uninitiated, ring groups (aka round robins) are a simultaneous calling system that notifies some or all group members about an incoming call. The ringing stops when someone answers the phone or when the call is sent to a voicemail greeting.

A ring group is an excellent feature for teams looking to increase communication flexibility and responsiveness. The trouble is that Google Voice ring groups are only available on their Standard or higher plans — which cost at least $20 per month per user.

Costs can add up quickly, and for small businesses just getting their feet wet, this might become a massive drain on internal resources.

Why OpenPhone is the best VoIP to get toll-free numbers

OpenPhone is an FCC-approved provider of toll-free numbers, which means it’s authorized by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to distribute toll-free numbers to businesses. 

Here’s a breakdown of what you’ll get when you purchase a toll-free number with OpenPhone:

• Choose from thousands of US and Canadian toll-free phone numbers to find the best one for your business.
• Purchase local phone numbers along with your toll-free number, making sure you can build a local presence for calling customers who live in a specific community.
• Additional toll-free and local numbers only cost $5 per number per month.
• You can purchase as many toll-free phone numbers as you need, which is useful when your business starts to scale and you need to hire more reps.
• Purchase vanity phone numbers so customers can call a memorable number, like 1-800-FLOWERS or 1-800-CONTACTS.
• Free outbound calls to the US and Canada come with every plan, which means you won’t have to pay long-distance fees when your reps make domestic calls or calls to Canada.

Here are more advanced business features you have access to when you choose OpenPhone:

• Works on any device. Make and receive calls and texts from your toll-free number on any device, including Androids, laptops, iPhones, or tablets (all you need is WiFi).
• Work together with your team to solve customer issues. OpenPhone’s shared numbers let reps collaborate via internal threads. For example, you can mention team members to quickly get their attention or write team-only contact notes like special dates or occasions that help keep reps up-to-date.
• See when a team member is typing in a conversation. You don’t need to worry about sending multiple replies to the same customer at once, preventing awkward moments.
• Have shared access to customer contact details. Your team won’t have to spend time reaching out to reps asking for specific information since it’s visible internally.
• Get the full context of customer conversations. With OpenPhone, all communications are in a unified inbox, including calls, call recordings, missed calls, texts, and voicemails. This means you don’t need to spend time searching through different folders to understand how to best help customers.

Get started with OpenPhone’s toll-free phone number lookup tool

OpenPhone lets you choose from thousands of phone numbers with 800, 833, 844, 855, 866, 877, and 888 toll-free codes.

Here’s our toll-free phone number lookup tool to help you find the best toll-free phone number for your business:

Moving other existing Google Voice phone numbers to OpenPhone

If you’re tired of being limited by Google Voice and are actively looking for an alternative solution, porting your number to a new provider that offers toll-free numbers should be your next step. Here’s how:

How to port your number out of the free plan of Google Voice

1. Go to voice.google.com, sign in to your account, and at the top right, select Settings.
2. Go to Account.
3. Tap Unlock under the number you wish to port.

4. You’ll see a pop-up message asking you to confirm.

5. You’ll need to pay a $3 porting fee via Google Pay to unlock your number.

Now you can port the unlocked number to another provider.

Porting a number from Google Voice for Google Workspace

1. Sign in to the Google Admin console.
2. Select Apps > Google Workspace > Google Voice.
3. Select Number porting.
4. Select Port-out info to open the window, and click on Preview to see the code.
5. Copy the code.
6. Your new provider may request additional information based on your location to port your Google Voice number.

Porting your Google Voice number to OpenPhone

Now that you have unbarred access to your digits, you can port your number to another carrier — including the team at OpenPhone. 

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Sign up for a free seven-day trial to see why thousands of growing businesses use OpenPhone.
2. Once you’ve confirmed that OpenPhone is a great fit for your team, fill out the porting request form in the OpenPhone app with all your information to initiate your porting request.

3. Give us about two weeks (give or take) to get everything set up.
4. And just like that, you’re done! Now you can upgrade to as many phone numbers as you’d like, including US or Canadian toll-free numbers. Due to emerging regulations, you’ll first need to complete US carrier registration to text from a local number. And if you have a toll-free number, you’ll need to complete the toll-free registration.

The alternative to no Google Voice toll-free numbers: OpenPhone

Google Voice is missing a whole lot more than just toll-free numbers. Without integrations, business SMS support, or team collaboration, this VoIP can be extremely limiting to business growth.

If you’re looking to scale your company’s communications effectively, turning to OpenPhone as a Google Voice alternative is the obvious choice. We’re the number one rated business VoIP platform on G2 — and it’s not hard to see why.

On OpenPhone, you can make and send free calls and texts to the US and Canada from almost anywhere. And did we mention that we offer toll-free numbers? It’s easy to see OpenPhone’s solutions in action. Sign up for a free demo with a live expert for real-time Q&A or get hands-on with our platform using a seven-day free trial.