Get a phone number
By the end of this page you’ll have a real Indian phone number provisioned to your project, ready to attach to a voice agent.
Prerequisites
- Starter Starter or above. On Free or App Lite the Exotel pages don’t open at all.
- Enough credits to cover the monthly rental. The exact figure is shown before you confirm.
Open the numbers list
From Integrations → Exotel, click Manage Numbers. If this is your first number you’ll see an empty state; otherwise you get a card per number.
The subheading tracks your allowance — for example 2 numbers used. On a paid plan there’s no cap on how many you can hold, so this is a running count rather than a limit.
Provision one
Click Get New Number. The dialog walks through three steps.
Choose a number
The first step is titled Choose a Phone Number.
Provider is fixed at Exotel (qRaptor Managed) and Region at India (IN) — both are facts about the shared account, not choices.
Pick a Type, then click Show Available Numbers to query the live pool:
| Type | What it is |
|---|---|
| Local | A standard geographic landline number. The usual choice. |
| Toll Free | The caller isn’t charged. Availability varies. |
| Mobile | A mobile-range number. |
Each result shows the number, its region and its capabilities — Voice, and sometimes SMS. Select one with its radio button and click Next.
The pool is shared and live. If a type returns No available numbers for the selected region and type, try another type — it means Exotel has none free right now, not that something is broken.
Configure and confirm
The second step is Confirm Provisioning. Your chosen number is shown at the top with a Change link if you picked wrong.
| Field | What to put |
|---|---|
| Friendly Name | A label only you see — Support Line, Clinic Reception. Optional, but a list of bare +91… numbers gets confusing fast. |
| Access Mode | Public — any caller reaches the agent. Authorized Only — only numbers you whitelist. Public is the right default; see Control who can call. |
Beneath those, a summary shows the Monthly Cost in credits and your Plan Limit.
Click Provision Number.
Choosing Authorized Only here means the number answers nobody until you add at least one caller to its whitelist. If you’re not sure, start with Public.
Copy the number
Provisioning takes a few seconds — qRaptor reserves the credits, claims the number from Exotel, and records it against your project. You then get a confirmation showing the new number, its status, region, monthly cost and access mode, with a Copy Number button.
Click Done. The number appears in the list as Active.
What you have now
An Active number that is billing you and answering nobody. Its card reads Not attached under Agent, and a caller dialling it gets nothing useful.
That’s expected — Connect an agent is the next step, and it’s the one that makes the number do something.
Common issues
- The Exotel pages show an upgrade prompt instead of the numbers list — telephony isn’t in your plan. Free and App Lite don’t include it.
- “We couldn’t load your plan” — a transient failure talking to the billing service, not a plan problem. Retry; the button is right there. Provisioning stays blocked until it resolves, deliberately.
- No available numbers for the selected region and type — the shared pool is empty for that type. Try Local, which has the widest availability.
- Provisioning fails after you click Provision Number — usually insufficient credits. The reservation is checked before the number is claimed, so nothing is half-created; top up under Billing and try again.
- The number appears but the pool list still shows it — the list is a live query and can lag a moment. Refresh.