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Mobile, landline or VoIP: line types at signup

Every numbering plan divides its numbers into ranges and gives each range a line type: mobile, fixed line, toll-free, premium rate, VoIP and a few more. The range of a number is known the moment it is typed, without a call or a message. That is enough to refuse numbers that cannot receive a code or that cost money to reach. It is not enough to know who holds a number, or whether it is in service.

What the plans set apart

Line typePlans with such ranges, of 245A common choice at signupWhy
mobile244acceptReceives text messages and calls.
fixedLineOrMobile18acceptThe plan cannot tell the two apart from the number; refusing would refuse every ordinary +1 number.
fixedLine245refuse for a text, accept for a callMost fixed lines cannot receive a text message.
voip96your choiceNumbers in these ranges are cheap to obtain in quantity; many real people also have one.
tollFree184refuseThe called party pays; rarely the line of the person signing up.
premiumRate150refuseA call or message to it costs the sender and earns the holder.
sharedCost53refusePart of the cost of a call falls on the caller.
personalNumber59refuseA forwarding number, not a line: in the United Kingdom, 070 personal numbers look like 07 mobile numbers.
pager23refuseA one-way paging service.
uan63refuseA universal access number: one number for an organisation, routed to its lines.
voicemail15refuseReaches a mailbox, not a person.

VoIP ranges exist in 96 plans, among them France, the United Kingdom, Japan and Australia. Elsewhere VoIP services use ordinary geographic or mobile-range numbers, so a VoIP pattern only catches the ranges a plan sets aside.

+1: one pattern for mobile and fixed line

In Canada, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the United States, the mobile and fixed-line patterns are the same: area codes and exchanges serve both, so every ordinary number reads as fixedLineOrMobile. In 12 more plans, Chile, Denmark, the Dominican Republic, India, Jamaica, Mauritius, Mexico, Micronesia, St. Pierre & Miquelon, Tunisia, Uzbekistan and Wallis & Futuna, some ranges serve both. For +1 the allocation records go further: each central office code (the first six digits) is allocated to a carrier with a line type. The United States has 205,075 such codes on record, among them 101,552 fixed line, 66,155 mobile, 31,266 VoIP, on the United States page. That is the original allocation: numbers move between carriers when they are ported.

The check

After parse, the line type is a field of the number. The addition below accepts mobile numbers and the +1 numbers that may be mobile; add voip or fixedLine to the list if you take them. With the United Kingdom, the United States and France loaded:

NumberLine typeAccepted at signup
+44 7400 123456mobileyes
+44 121 234 5678fixedLineno
+44 56 1234 5678voipno
+44 901 234 5678premiumRateno
+44 70 1234 5678personalNumberno
+1 201-555-0123fixedLineOrMobileyes
+1 900-234-5678premiumRateno
+1 500-234-5678personalNumberno
+33 6 12 34 56 78mobileyes
+33 1 23 45 67 89fixedLineno
+33 9 12 34 56 78voipno
+33 891 12 34 56premiumRateno

Add it at the end of phone.mjs, the file from the JavaScript guide:

// Line types a signup takes: mobile, and the +1 numbers whose ranges serve both. Add voip or fixedLine if you take them.
const SIGNUP_TYPES = new Set(['mobile', 'fixedLineOrMobile'])
export const acceptAtSignup = (n) => SIGNUP_TYPES.has(n.type)

Sources: National numbering plans, ITU-T E.164 (ITU); North American Numbering Plan Administrator (NANPA); Canadian Numbering Administrator (CNAC). Plans as published on 2026-10-25.