What it costs to send texts from your own SIM vs. an SMS API

Every text your website, shop or app sends costs something. With an SMS API provider such as Twilio, Vonage or Plivo, your software sends from numbers you rent, and you pay for each text. With SMSTunnel, your own Android phone sends the texts from its SIM and your own number: you pay a flat plan for the service, and the texts go over your own mobile plan.

This guide puts numbers on both. The providers’ prices below are the US list prices our comparison pages recorded in November 2026. They differ by country and change over time, so check each provider’s own pricing for the countries you text. SMSTunnel’s plans are the ones on the pricing page.

One caution before the numbers: the two models don’t do the same job. An SMS API delivers every text over the carrier networks itself, and its price per text pays for that. With SMSTunnel, your phone does the delivery, so each text is paid for by your mobile plan, not by SMSTunnel. The right choice depends on what you send, how much, and to whom.

What an SMS API charges for

A provider’s bill has several lines. These are the US prices from our comparison pages:

	Twilio	Vonage	Plivo
Each text sent	$0.0083 per segment	$0.0086 per text	$0.0077 per segment
Each text received	$0.0083 per segment	$0.00691 per text	$0.0077 per segment
A local number	$1.15 a month	$1.09 to set up, first month included	$0.50 a month
Minimum spend	None	None	SMS only on its Enterprise plan, from $1,000 a month

On top of that:

• Carrier fees. US carriers add their own fee for each text sent, which the provider passes on: for example $0.0035 (AT&T), $0.0045 (T-Mobile) or $0.005 (Verizon). Some carriers charge for received texts too.
• Registration. To text US customers as a business from a local number, you register your brand and each use case for A2P 10DLC. At Twilio that’s a one-time brand fee of $4.50 (or $46 for a standard brand), $15 to review each use case, and $1.50 to $10 a month for each one. Vonage and Plivo charge similar fees, and Vonage adds $41.50 for the vetting most use cases need.
• Failed texts. Twilio charges $0.001 for each text that ends up failed.
• Replies. Every reply your customers send is a received text, and it’s billed like one.

Long texts and special characters

Providers bill per segment, and a segment holds up to 160 characters. A longer text goes out as several segments joined together, and each one counts. Characters outside the basic GSM alphabet, such as accented letters like ă or ș and most emoji, usually cut a segment to 70 characters, so the same message can cost two or three times as much. Your mobile plan usually counts the parts of a long text the same way, so short texts pay off with either model.

What you pay when your own phone sends

SMSTunnel charges a flat price, monthly or yearly, with nothing per text, nothing per number and no registration:

Plan	Price	What’s included
Free	$0	25 texts a day and 500 a month, sent as you wrote them, plus up to 25 more a day from your own software ending with a short “free by smstunnel.io” line; 50 sign-in codes a day
Starter	$9 a month	300 texts a day and 5,000 a month; sign-in codes with no daily cap
Standard	$19 a month	2,000 texts a day and 30,000 a month
Professional	$39 a month	No daily cap (rate-limited to protect your SIM); Maximum privacy
Enterprise	$99 a month	No daily cap; your organization’s own phones; separate API keys for each of your apps

Paying yearly costs ten months: $90, $190, $390 or $990 a year. Prices are in US dollars, before tax; where tax applies, it’s added at checkout and shown on your invoice. Plans are month to month or yearly, with no contract. Only the texts you send count toward a plan: the texts your phone receives don’t.

Then there’s your mobile plan. The texts leave from your SIM, so your carrier’s normal SMS charges or allowance apply, including for texts to other countries. Many plans include unlimited texts, but a personal plan may not allow business use: check your plan before your shop starts texting customers from it.

Two worked examples

The examples below use US prices and single-segment texts. Your own numbers will differ, but the shape of the bill won’t.

A shop sending 1,000 order texts a month

With Twilio:

• 1,000 texts × $0.0083 = $8.30
• carrier fees: about $3.50 to $5.00, depending on your customers’ carriers
• a local number: $1.15
• 10DLC: $1.50 to $10 a month for the use case, after $19.50 to $61 once

That’s roughly $14.45 to $24.45 a month, before any replies.

With SMSTunnel, 1,000 texts a month is about 33 a day, more than the Free plan’s 25 as written, so you’d pick Starter: $9 a month, or $90 a year, plus your mobile plan. The WooCommerce guide shows the setup for an online shop.

A business sending 10,000 texts a month

With Twilio, the texts alone come to $83, carrier fees add about $35 to $50, and the number and the registration add a few dollars more: roughly $120 to $145 a month.

With SMSTunnel, 10,000 texts a month is about 330 a day, past Starter’s 300, so Standard at $19 a month fits, plus your mobile plan. At this volume, check that your plan allows that many texts, and remember that one phone sends at its own pace (more on that below).

Sign-in codes

Twilio Verify sends codes and checks them for you: $0.05 per successful verification plus $0.0083 per text in the US. Vonage Verify charges $0.06084 per successful verification plus messaging rates, and Plivo Verify charges no verification fee, only the text. With SMSTunnel, your software makes the code and checks it, and SMSTunnel sends the text, with a separate allowance: 50 codes a day on Free and no daily cap on paid plans. The sign-in codes guide covers Supabase, Auth0, Clerk and Better Auth.

Other tools that send from your own phone

SMSTunnel isn’t the only way to send from an Android phone. textbee has a free plan with 50 texts a day (300 a month) on one phone, where received texts count too, then Pro at $14.99 and Scale at $29.99 a month. httpSMS has 200 free texts a month, sent and received together, and paid plans from $10 to $350 a month. Like SMSTunnel, neither charges per text: your carrier’s charges apply. Both are open source and can run on your own server, and both install from an APK rather than from Google Play.

When an SMS API is worth the price

Our comparison pages are frank about this. Choose an SMS API provider when:

• you send high volumes: registered 10DLC numbers and short codes send many texts a second, while SMSTunnel sends what one phone can;
• you need a short code, a toll-free number or a sender name instead of a phone number;
• you text US customers as a business from a local number, where A2P 10DLC registration is the route US carriers set;
• delivery mustn’t depend on a phone being on and online;
• you need numbers in many countries without a SIM in each;
• you want MMS, WhatsApp or RCS from the same API, or a service that checks sign-in codes for you;
• you have no Android phone to keep on and online.

You can also use both: everyday texts from your own number, and a provider for the rest.

The limits of one phone

A flat plan doesn’t turn a phone into a carrier. Keep these limits in mind:

• Pace. The API takes 30 send requests a minute on each send endpoint.
• Daily caps. Free, Starter and Standard have daily caps. Professional and Enterprise don’t, but they’re rate-limited to protect your SIM.
• One recipient per text. Each person gets their own text.
• A phone that’s on. If your phone is offline, the text waits and goes out when it’s back, for up to 3 days; after that, it’s marked failed.
• Status. You get pending, sent or failed, as your phone reports it.

If your app sends for many clients, each from their own phone and number, that’s the Enterprise plan: see one app, each client’s own number.

Common questions

Does SMSTunnel charge per message?

No. The plans are flat, and your texts go out from your own SIM, so your carrier’s normal SMS rates or allowance apply.

Is the Free plan enough to start?

For testing and small volumes, yes, and it needs no credit card: 25 texts a day and 500 a month as you wrote them, plus 50 sign-in codes a day. Texts your own software sends beyond that, up to 25 more a day, end with a short “free by smstunnel.io” line. Paid plans add nothing to your texts.

Can I keep my SMS API provider?

Yes. Texts sent through SMSTunnel come from the SIM in your phone, and your provider’s numbers keep working. You can send everyday texts from your own number and keep the provider for high volumes, short codes or other countries.