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GeezerVison is showing textbee.dev — Android SMS Gateway & Text Message API, free to start

Trusted by 40,000+ developers and businesses

Turn your Android phone into an SMS gateway.

No per-message fees, no new hardware. Text your customers from your own number, or send and receive SMS from your app with one REST API. textbee is the open-source Twilio alternative for reminders, order updates, follow-ups, and OTPs.

See how it works
Watch the 1-minute videoText a customer list, no code neededWorks with n8n, Zapier, Make, and MCP-enabled AI agents
textbee Android SMS gateway app sending messages
Cost savings
98%
vs. traditional SMS gateways
Setup time
3 min
on average
Messages
1M+
sent per month
Source
Open source
Self-hostable, on GitHub

Features

Everything you need to send & receive SMS

Send and receive SMS online with your Android phone. Simple API, webhooks, and bulk messaging. Learn how to send SMS or receive SMS in the docs, or try our SMS tools. Start on the free SMS API tier: 300 messages a month, no credit card. Prefer the other name? The text message API page walks through the same calls.

SMS API

Send SMS from any app with a single REST call. No SDKs to wrestle, no vendor lock-in, and it works with Node, Python, cURL, or anything that speaks HTTP.

Read the send docs

Receive SMS online

Receive inbound texts via webhooks or the API. Build OTP verification, support inboxes, and true two-way messaging.

Read the receive docs

Bulk messaging

Reach many recipients in a single API call: campaigns, alerts, and broadcasts without writing loops.

SMS templates

Reusable templates with dynamic variables so your team ships consistent messages faster.

Advanced analytics

See delivery, volume, and performance at a glance with detailed reports.

Multi-device support

Connect up to 5 Android phones to spread load and stay reliable at higher volume.

Open source

The whole stack is on GitHub: audit it, self-host it, and trust exactly what you run.

Open source SMS gateway guide

Message scheduling

Queue messages for a specific time up to 72 hours ahead and let textbee send them.

View all Pro features

How it works

Live in under 5 minutes

Install the app to turn your Android device into an SMS gateway, then call the API from your own applications. No carrier contracts, no hardware.

  1. 0130 seconds

    Download the Android app

    Install the free, open-source textbee app on any Android phone.

    Scan with your phone to download
    Get the app
  2. 021 minute

    Generate an API key

    Create a secure API key from your dashboard. Unlimited keys per account.

    Open dashboard
  3. 031 minute

    Scan the QR code

    Scan the code in the app (or paste the key) and enable the gateway.

  4. 04Instant

    Start sending

    Fire your first SMS from the dashboard or the API. You are live.

    View API docs

Use cases

From appointment reminders to two-way support

One API, many jobs. Businesses and developers use textbee anywhere a text needs to reach a real phone.

Appointment reminders

Cut no-shows with automated reminders for clinics, salons, contractors, and home services.

Order notifications

Confirmations, shipping updates, and delivery alerts your customers actually read.

Customer follow-ups

Follow up on quotes, leads, and showings from the number your customers already know.

Announcements and promotions

Text your congregation, club, or opt-in customer list from your own number.

Two-way support

Receive replies over webhooks and hold real conversations with customers.

OTP and 2FA

Send time-sensitive verification codes to secure logins and accounts.

See all use cases with code examples

Video

See textbee in under a minute

Send SMS from your computer or your app through your own Android phone. Replies come back to your dashboard or webhook.

Developer friendly

An SMS gateway API you integrate in minutes

Our REST API makes it easy to integrate SMS capabilities into any application. Just a few lines of code is all you need.

Send an SMS message

Choose your preferred language

Endpoint: POST /send-sms
Rate limit: 60/min
JavaScript
1import axios from 'axios'
2
3const API_KEY = 'YOUR_API_KEY'
4
5const response = await axios.post(`https://api.textbee.dev/api/v1/gateway/send-sms`, {
6  recipients: [ '+12025550123' ],
7  message: 'Hello from textbee.dev!',
8}, {
9  headers: {
10    'x-api-key': API_KEY,
11  },
12})
13
14console.log(response.data)
Full API documentation is available at textbee.dev/docs

Pricing reality

Same SMS, different bill

Twilio is carrier-grade throughput you rent. textbee is the phone you already own. Here is the honest trade-off.

How they compare
textbee
Twilio
Per-message fee
$0, sent over your own carrier plan
From $0.0083/SMS plus carrier fees
Monthly platform cost
Free, or $14.99/mo on Pro
Phone number rental from about $1.15/mo, plus usage
Setup
Install the app, scan a key, live in about 3 minutes
Account, number provisioning, A2P 10DLC registration
Hosting and source
Open source, self-hostable
Proprietary, cloud only
Best for
500 to about 50k messages/mo, and keeping the money
Millions of messages/mo with guaranteed throughput

Twilio figures are approximate US list prices and change over time. If you send millions of messages a month, Twilio is the right tool. For everything below that, keep the money. See the full Twilio SMS pricing breakdown.

Pricing

Simple, transparent pricing

Flat pricing with no per-message fees. Plans that grow with you, cancel anytime. Save 44% with annual billing, 5 months free.

You're saving 44% with yearly billing, 5 months free

Free

Get started with basic SMS gateway features

$0/month

No credit card required

  • Send and receive SMS Messages
  • Register 1 active device
  • Max 50 messages per day
  • Up to 300 messages per month
  • Webhook notifications
  • Basic support
Get Started Free
Most Popular

Pro

Perfect for businesses and serious users

$14.99/mo
Billed monthly
$8.33/mo
Billed $99.99 yearly
$179.88
Save 44% · 5 months free
$14.99 per month
$99.99 per year
  • Everything in Free plan
  • Register up to 5 active devices
  • Unlimited daily messages
  • Up to 5,000 messages per month
  • Message templates with variables
  • Priority support
Start with Pro
7-day money-back guarantee
Best Value

Scale

For growing teams sending at volume

$29.99/mo
Billed monthly
$16.67/mo
Billed $199.99 yearly
$359.88
Save 44% · 5 months free
$29.99 per month
$199.99 per year
  • Everything in Pro plan
  • Register up to 15 active devices
  • Unlimited daily messages
  • Up to 25,000 messages per month
  • Message templates with variables
  • Priority support
Start with Scale
7-day money-back guarantee

Custom

Let's talk about your needs

Tailored solutions for high-volume needs and specific requirements.

  • Everything in Pro plan
  • Custom message volume limits
  • White-labeled solution
  • Custom integrations
  • SLA with uptime guarantees
  • Dedicated account manager
  • Volume discounts
Contact Sales
Need custom integration work? See services

Frequently asked questions

Twilio gives you guaranteed carrier-grade throughput. If you're sending a million 2FA codes a day, use Twilio. If you're sending 500-50,000/mo and want to keep the money, use textbee.
Yes it's legal. No, your SIM won't get banned if you use it like a human. Sending SMS from your own phone over your own plan is legal anywhere SMS is. Stay within your carrier's fair-use policy (usually 200-500/day on consumer SIMs) and you're fine. Carriers don't ban SIMs for sending, they ban patterns that look like spam. Sending higher volume? register multiple devices and SIMs to distribute the load.
No. textbee sends from the SIM in your own phone, so there is nothing to provision: no number to rent, no brand or campaign registration (10DLC), no sender ID application. Consent rules still apply wherever you send, so keep a record of consent and honor STOP.
Yes, you can cancel your Pro subscription at any time. If you cancel, you'll still have access to Pro features until the end of your billing period. We also offer a 7-day money-back guarantee for new Pro subscriptions.
The Pro plan allows you to connect up to 5 active Android devices simultaneously, which helps distribute your message load and provides redundancy if one device goes offline. If you need more devices, reach out to us.
You can send to many recipients in a single request, and your plan quota is what governs the total. Worth knowing: your own Android phone sends the messages, one at a time with a short pause between each, so a large batch is delivered steadily over time rather than all at once. Your bulk send limit is shown on the billing page in your dashboard.
No, you cannot customize the sender ID. Messages are sent using your device's phone number and SIM card, so recipients will see your phone number as the sender. Brand names or custom sender IDs are not supported.
No, textbee.dev currently works only on Android devices. Apple's iOS restrictions prevent the installation of custom SMS messaging apps, so iPhone support is not available at this time.
textbee.dev requires Android 7.0 (Nougat) or higher. Make sure your device meets this requirement before installing the app.
Yes! You can receive real-time notifications for SMS status updates (sent, delivered, failed) using webhooks. Configure webhooks in your dashboard to automatically receive notifications when these events occur. You can also check message status from the dashboard.
Yes, you can receive SMS messages sent to your device's phone number. Enable SMS receiving in the app settings, then retrieve messages via the API or set up webhooks for real-time notifications when messages are received.

In the wild

Old phones, real workloads

Real answers from our 10,000-developer milestone survey. Nonprofits, salons, universities, and indie builders running production SMS on hardware they already had.

We are a small construction company and we send messages to our team of 12. It works better than group messaging for announcements and notifications, with no off-topic replies.
JG
Josh Grode Wolters
All States Concrete Cutting
Very satisfied
We send a notification SMS after each successful donation, wired up through the API and make.com. It just works for our small two-person team.
NS
Naga sai Vishnu
Ashraya Trust
Very satisfied
We built a student and alumni document-request system for a university. textbee handles the automated notifications: verification codes, request updates, and approval messages.
N
Norhan
CFCST
Very satisfied
We use the API to send SMS through our clients and agents, including notifying an agent the moment a new lead is assigned to them.
JM
Juanpay Markitech
88vipventures.com
Very satisfied
It powers the SMS in our booking system for beauty salons.
RB
Robin Bortlik
smskalendar.cz
Satisfied
Réviscool is a new online learning platform for Haitian students to review their lessons with quizzes and flashcards. We were looking for a free SMS provider to receive OTP codes and secure access to our data. textbee was the answer.
ES
Elie Stéphane
Réviscool
Very satisfied

Your phone is already an SMS gateway. Switch it on.

Set up in minutes and send your first message for free. No credit card, no per-message fees, no carrier contracts.

Free tier forever No credit card required Open source

Need self-hosting help or a custom integration? See services

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