Sometimes, you may need to get in touch with someone who has blocked your number or blocked it without meaning too This could be an emergency situation, a mix-up that needs sorting out, or simply a case of an older relative who is not technologically savvy.
Whatever the reason, there are a few legitimate ways to reach that person without violating their privacy or attempting anything invasive. Before we dive in, we must say that you should never try to call someone who blocked you unless you have a very legitimate, well-intentioned reason.
When you call a blocked number, the call leaves your phone, reaches the recipient’s carrier, and arrives at their device, but it won’t ring.
According to Apple, when someone blocks a number on iPhone, the caller can still leave a voicemail, but the recipient gets no notification, messages are not delivered, and the blocked contact is not alerted. Android works much the same way, filing blocked calls and messages into a separate spam folder.
For more information here, read our article on what happens when you call a blocked number, plus the mechanics of blocking on iPhone and on Android.
On iPhone, a blocked caller can still leave a voicemail. It lands in a separate Blocked Messages section with no alert and no badge, so it sits there until the recipient looks.
If you have something legitimate to say, this is the method that respects the block and still lets you say it.
Dial *67 before the number and your caller ID is withheld, so you show up as No Caller ID or Private instead of your number. Block lists pertain to a specific number, so a withheld call can sometimes slip past a the filter.
Here is why it usually does not:
People who block someone often turn on unknown-caller filtering, so the *67 won’t work. Our guide to hiding your phone number when calling covers what *67 does and does not do in more detail.
This is the only method that will definitely let you call a number that blocked you and make the phone on the other end ring. A different line, a work phone, a landline, or a VoIP number from a second-line app will ring normally, because the filter has nothing to match against. While this method works, you should think about whether you really need to use it. Your reasons need to be sound and well-intentioned.
Blocking someone’s number stops calls and SMS from that number. It does not block WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, Instagram, or email, each of which keeps its own block list. If someone blocked your number and left your accounts alone, those channels are still open.
The internet is full of confident nonsense, but here’s a quick list of methods that definitely won’t work.
Blocking is usually a boundary someone set on purpose. As we stated in this article’s intor, there are a few reasons why you might need to get in touch without someone. Maybe you need a shared account, information about your child’s, or details about an unpaid invoice. There could be a family emergency, or perhaps you locked yourself out of your house and don’t have a spare key. Maybe it’s an older relative who blocked you on accident. True emergencies and accidents are potentially valid reasons to try the methods listed above.
Sometimes, however, you don’t have a good reason for getting around a blocked number. In that case, stop what you are doing. The law draws a sharp line in the sand about that. It’s harassment, it’s wrong, and you could wind up in serious trouble. We do not condone behavior like this, nor should you.
Under federal law, 47 U.S.C. § 223 makes it a crime to call without disclosing your identity with intent to harass, or to make someone's phone ring repeatedly to harass. Penalties run up to two years in pirson. This means using an anonymous number to repeatedly call someone. In other words, *67 plus persistence, is described almost word for word in the statute. State stalking laws layer on top, and if a protective order is in place, contact from any number can violate it.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics found 3.4 million people age 16 or older were stalking victims in 2019, and the most common behavior reported was unwanted calls, voice messages, or texts, at roughly 66% of cases. Don’t help add to that number.
A call going straight to voicemail after half a ring is the classic sign of a blocked number. It is also what a dead battery, airplane mode, Do Not Disturb, and no signal all look like. If the phone rings four or five times first, you are probably not blocked.
Our guide on how to tell if someone blocked you separates the two on iPhone, Android, and iMessage. If you are on the other end of this equation, unblocking a number on iPhone takes 10 seconds to do.
All of this works in the other direction too. Block one number, and a call arrives the next day from a different one. Scammers run this at industrial scale, cycling through numbers faster than anyone can block them, as do debt collectors working outside the rules. Our field guide to unknown numbers and No Caller ID sorts the categories, and our article on stopping spam calls layers the filters that catch most of them.
When an unfamiliar number keeps calling, a reverse phone lookup may surface publicly available information tied to it, including a possible name, general location, line type (mobile, landline, or VoIP), and any linked public profiles. In some cases, that is enough to tell whether the number belongs to a stranger, a business, or the source you already blocked.
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