Use cases

How do you check phone numbers before sending them a text message?

Before a send, check that each number is possible in its country, see what number type the plan assigns, and look at complaint history on the number. That removes malformed entries, toll-free and premium-rate numbers and numbers people already report, so fewer messages go to places they cannot land.

The problem

A text campaign is only as good as its number column. Numbers with a missing digit, numbers copied in the wrong country format and toll-free or premium-rate lines all consume sends and show up as failures in your messaging platform.

Numbers that attract complaints are a separate problem: they point to lists that were scraped or recycled. Seeing the history before the send lets you hold those rows back.

The FTC reported that people reported $470 million in losses to text message scams in 2024, more than five times the 2020 number. 2024. Top text scams of 2024 (Federal Trade Commission, April 14, 2025), read 2026-10-18.

What LookValid does for this

LookValid products for SMS deliverability
Check	What it gives you	Credits
Drop numbers that are not possible or not textable types	Returns the number type the plan assigns, such as mobile, toll-free, premium-rate or VoIP, with clean E.164 formatting for your messaging platform. US and Canada numbers usually come back as fixed line or mobile because the plan does not separate them, so use the type to drop toll-free and premium-rate rows. It does not query carriers, so it cannot say whether a line is active.	1 credit per valid number
See complaint history on a number	Returns how many consumer complaints name the number, the first and last report dates and the kinds of calls reported. These are unverified reports, not a verdict about the number.	1 credit per number with complaints on record
Group US numbers by original carrier	Returns the carrier first assigned the number block, with rate center and state. Porting is not reflected, so a moved number still shows its original carrier. Use it to segment sends, not to route them.	1 credit per lookup (numbers outside the covered numbering plan areas are free)
Resolve country and dialing rules	Looks up a calling code, region or country name and returns national number lengths, dialing prefixes and example numbers, which helps fix entries typed without a country code.	1 credit per lookup (an unknown code, country or name is free)

A real request and response

This request checks one number before a send. The response is a real capture: the E.164 form to hand to your messaging platform and the number type from the numbering plan.

POST /v1/phone

1{
2  "phone": "+12025550143"
3}

Response, captured 2026-10-18

1{
2  "found": true,
3  "data": {
4    "valid": true,
5    "possible": true,
6    "e164": "+12025550143",
7    "national_format": "(202) 555-0143",
8    "international_format": "+1 202 555 0143",
9    "country_calling_code": "1",
10    "country": "US",
11    "number_type": "fixed_line_or_mobile",
12    "line_type_source": "numbering-plan",
13    "carrier": null,
14    "area_code": "202",
15    "area_code_region": {
16      "code": "DC",
17      "name": "District of Columbia"
18    },
19    "extension": null,
20    "notes": "Line type comes from the numbering plan, not from a carrier. Carrier, porting, line status and reachability are not included; this check cannot say whether the number is active or has been moved to another carrier."
21  }
22}

This is one real run of Phone Numbering-Plan Validation against a fixed public input, captured 2026-10-18. Sources: Google libphonenumber metadata (Apache-2.0); NANPA area code report (nanpa.com).

Questions

Does the check tell me a number will receive my text?

No. It shows whether the number is possible and what type the numbering plan gives it. Whether a particular handset receives a message depends on the carrier and the recipient.

What does the complaint lookup actually return?

A count of consumer reports that name the number, when they were first and last filed and the issue types, plus a score and risk level derived from those counts. It is not proof about who owns the number.

Why does the carrier sometimes look wrong?

The carrier lookup returns the company first assigned the US number block. When a number has been ported to another carrier, the original assignment still shows.

Sources

Top text scams of 2024 (Federal Trade Commission, April 14, 2025) https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/data-visualizations/data-spotlight/2025/04/top-text-scams-2024, read 2026-10-18

LookValid is run by Meralume Labs. It is not connected to, endorsed by or a partner of any company or product named on this page, and every product name belongs to its owner.

LookValid bills every lookup in credits from one shared balance, so one key covers each check on this page.

See Phone Numbering-Plan Validation