phone-calling.mdx

title	subtitle	slug
Phone Calling	Learn how to create and configure phone numbers with Vapi.	phone-calling

You can set up a phone number to place and receive phone calls. Phone numbers can be created directly through Vapi, or you can use your own from Twilio.

You can create a free phone number through the dashboard or use the /phone-numbers endpoint.

If you want to use your own phone number, you can also use the dashboard or the /phone-numbers/import endpoint. This will use your Twilio credentials to verify the number and configure it with Vapi services.

You can place an outbound call from one of your phone numbers using the [`/call/phone`](/api-reference/calls/create-phone-call) endpoint. If the system message will be different with every call, you can specify a temporary assistant in the `assistant` field. If you want to reuse an assistant, you can specify its ID in the `assistantId` field. You can provide an `assistantId` to a phone number and it will use that assistant when receiving inbound calls.

You may want to specify the assistant based on the caller's phone number. If a phone number doesn't have an assistantId, Vapi will attempt to retrieve the assistant from your server using your Server URL.

Video Tutorial on How to Import Numbers from Twilio for International Calls:

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