Set up an AI phone agent in ten minutes

Two decisions to make before you start

The slow part of setting up an AI phone agent isn't the software. It's you, staring at a box that says "name", wondering what to call the thing. So decide two things before you open the sign-up page and the rest goes quickly.

First, the name. A first name works best, because the line introduces itself with it and callers will repeat it back. In our examples the line is Lloyd and the owner is Graham, so callers hear that they've reached Graham's phone and that this is Lloyd, Graham's assistant. If it's for a business, you can name the line after the company instead.

Second, the area code. Pick the one your callers expect to see. Have your own mobile number to hand as well, because the line needs to know which phone is yours.

Minute one is for signing up

You sign up with an email address and choose a plan. Plans start from $29 a month and the pricing page lays out what each one includes. Payment comes before a number is issued, because every number costs real money to provision. There's nothing to install at any point.

Minutes two and three go on the name and the number

Give the line the name you chose. Then type your area code and pick the exact number from a short list. Any US area code with numbers available will do. Take a moment over this one, because a number is tied to the month you've paid for and you can't swap it on a whim.

The line also gets its own email address at this point, which turns out to be more useful than it sounds. We wrote about that in what to do with your line's email address.

Last, tell it who you are: your name and your mobile number. This is what lets the line tell you apart from everybody else who rings.

Minute four, save it as a contact

Save the new number in your phone under the line's name, the way you'd save a person. It sounds too small to be a step. It isn't.

You're going to call and text this number, often while walking to the car, and you won't do it if you have to hunt for it. The line will also ring you sometimes, for instance when you ask it to wait on hold and put you through once a person answers. You want to recognize that call when it comes.

Minute five, call it

Ring the line from your own mobile. Because it knows your number, it treats what you say as an instruction, not as a stranger getting in touch. Say something small and real. It captures the ask and reads back what it heard.

Then, if there's another phone in the house, call from that one too. Now you're a stranger, and you'll hear what your plumber or your kid's school will hear: a polite assistant that asks who's calling and what they need, and doesn't hand out your details. It's worth hearing both sides once.

Minutes six and seven, give it one real job

Pick a call you've been putting off. There's always one. Then ask for it, by calling the line, by texting it from your mobile, or from your dashboard.

Say what you'd tell a person, including what to do when the first answer is no. "Call the garage and see if they can take the car Thursday morning. Friday before ten is fine too." That second sentence is the difference between a call that gets it done and a call that comes back with a question. There's a whole piece on writing a call brief that works if you want to get good at this.

Calls take minutes, not seconds. When it's over you get a written summary: what happened, what was agreed, and the words that were said.

The last three minutes are for Settings

Open Settings. You don't need to touch everything in there today, and we'd rather you didn't. These are the ones that change how the very next call goes.

• The voice. There are 38, in two sets, and each has a play button. Listen to a few and pick one that suits the name. "Hear it" calls your mobile so you can listen on a real phone.
• The greeting. What callers hear first. Leave the default alone unless you have a reason to change it.
• Standing instructions. The things the line should always know, in plain English: how to handle the school, which restaurants you like, what never to promise.
• How many rings before it answers. Right away feels efficient. A ring or two feels more like a person.
• Who the line knows. Add family as VIP and the people you deal with every week as approved. Five names is plenty to begin with.
• Replace voicemail. If you want the line to pick up the calls you miss on your mobile, this section shows your carrier's code with your number filled in.
• The morning brief. One email a day at the hour you choose. Quiet days send nothing.

What can wait until tomorrow

Connecting another assistant, for one. The line works on its own, so there's no need to wire it up to Grok, ChatGPT or Claude on the first day. When you want to, the integrations page shows how, and it's a paste and a click.

Pronunciations can wait as well. You can teach the line up to 20 words to say your way, and you'll only know which ones matter after a few calls, when it trips over your street or your surname. Same for the speaking pace.

And the contact list will grow without any help from you. Each time someone rings who should have been on it, add them. After two weeks the line knows your world about as well as a new hire would, and you never sat down to teach it.

Common questions

More on setup guides

• Conditional call forwarding, explained without the jargon
• Connect Claude to a phone line
• Get ChatGPT to make a phone call
• Give your Grok Bot a phone number