Best visual voicemail apps for Android and iOS

Best visual voicemail apps in a nutshell:

• Google Voice — best budget option
• YouMail — best for avoiding unwanted calls
• HulloMail — best interface
• Voxist — best all-rounder
• InstaVoice — best for managing multiple phone numbers

What is visual voicemail?

Visual voicemail is a service that gives you easy access to all of the voicemails in a neatly organized and easy-to-understand structure. With visual voicemail, you can quickly see information like the person who’s sent the message, its duration, and when it was sent, and in most cases, you can also get a transcribed version of what was said.

What can I do with visual voicemail?

Visual voicemail essentials

Depending on what platform you decide to use, you can get different features related to visual voicemail. In general, though, most visual voicemail services include a dashboard that gathers all of the voicemail messages you receive, which gives you a quick overview and helps you navigate through them. You also get access to helpful information regarding the message itself and the person who has sent it.

Additionally, you can interact with the messages to rearrange, reply, delete, forward, and more. Many services also allow you to receive your voicemails in your email or via text as well.

Voicemail transcription

Voicemail transcription is a feature that most visual voicemail services have, and it transforms the contents of a message into text. That way, you don’t have to listen through the voicemail but can quickly skim through the information, which is helpful when you are in a hurry or you can’t play the audio at that time and place.

Voicemail greetings

Most voicemail apps will give the option to create your own voicemail greeting, which is very helpful if you have a business to run and want to make a good first impression while adding your personal touch. Some apps also take this further by allowing you to make specific greetings, tailored to individual phone numbers from your contact list.

How we choose the apps in this list

We aimed at choosing apps that have good overall reputation and cover all the basics of what a visual voicemail service should offer. We also wanted to include apps that have their own special twist, to give that niche edge for individual use cases. Additionally, we looked for apps that are available on both iOS and Android, so that you can get them no matter what kind of phone you use.

How do I choose the best visual voicemail app?

Each of the applications we have picked for this list come with their own unique specialty. The best way to approach this is to first learn about what visual voicemail is all about to begin with. Then, it’s time to figure out what exactly you want to take out of such a service and how much you are willing to pay (or not pay) for it. After that it is a simple matter of checking which app fits your requirements the most and testing it out — most of them come with some type of free trial or even free features, so you should be able to get an idea whether it tickles your fancy or not.

Best visual voicemail apps

Google Voice

If there is an application that can be considered a go-to choice for visual voicemail, then Google Voice would be that app. It is very easy to set up once installed and works as a voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) service for users of Google Workspace.

Google Voice’s visual voicemail feature is among the best, as it utilizes the company’s renowned proficiency in artificial intelligence to accurately transcribe voicemail, although other Visual Voicemail services have now started to implement AI transcription too.

After a voicemail is transcribed, it is sent to your email, or your phone via text, or you can open it by simply going to the Google Voice app.

Another benefit of Google Voice is that the app is free, although you do have to pay for a subscription if you want to use some of its more advanced VoIP features.