A brand posts “text us for the code,” buys a local number from an SMS platform, and finds that messages to US phones do not go out. The number works. The account is funded. What is missing is a carrier registration, and it carries charges that never appear in the per-text price on the pricing page. For the cost of texting customers after a visit, see what texting customers for reviews costs. This page covers the registration layer underneath.
The moment sending stops: what a text-to-join post runs into
Twilio’s A2P 10DLC documentation defines the terms. A2P is Application-to-Person messaging, meaning SMS or MMS traffic in which a person receives messages from an application rather than from another individual. 10DLC is a 10-digit long code, the ordinary local number. Twilio describes A2P 10DLC as the standard US carriers put in place so that SMS traffic to US users through long code numbers is verified and consensual, and it notes that carriers treat any message sent from a Twilio number, or any other messaging provider’s number, as application to person (Twilio documentation, fetched 2026-10-09).
This applies to a brand sending opt-in texts to US recipients from a standard local number. The subject is a list people chose to join, and the focus is cost layers. This is not legal advice on consent or opt-out rules.
If the list starts from a form, see response limits on lead capture forms. If the texts are login codes, SMS and voice verification costs prices that case.
Four separate charges that get called “the price of SMS”
The bill has four layers. Two are per message: the per-segment send price and the carrier pass-through fee. Two or three are per account or per campaign: number rental, brand registration, campaign vetting and the monthly campaign fee. A headline rate covers only the first.
The three vendors’ published figures sit side by side below, not ranked.
| Vendor | Published send rate (US, long code, outbound) | Carrier layer as published | Number rental, long code |
|---|---|---|---|
| Twilio | $0.0083 per 160-character segment | Example fees: $0.0035 AT&T, $0.0045 T-Mobile, $0.005 Verizon | $1.15 per month leased, $0.50 per month if you bring your own number |
| Telnyx | $0.004 per message part, plus carrier fee | Carrier passthrough shown as its own line; its worked example uses a blended US figure of $0.0038 per part | Not on the pricing page; Telnyx says numbers are their own primitive |
| Plivo | $0.0077 per SMS, plus carrier surcharge | Surcharge table: $0.0035 AT&T, $0.0045 T-Mobile, $0.0050 Verizon, outbound long code | $0.50 per month |
Sources: Twilio US SMS pricing, Telnyx messaging pricing and Plivo US SMS pricing, each fetched 2026-10-09. A lower number in the second column is not comparable until the carrier column and the registration layer are added.
What registration costs on Twilio’s three routes
Twilio’s A2P 10DLC page, fetched on 2026-10-09, lists the registration cost by route. It says the cost depends on the type of registration being completed.
| Route | Brand registration | Campaign vetting | Monthly per campaign | Eligibility as published |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | $44 one time | $15 per campaign, one time | from $1.50 to $10 | Business tax ID (EIN), over 6,000 segments per day, high throughput |
| Low-volume standard | $4 one time | $15 per campaign, one time | from $1.50 to $10 | Business tax ID (EIN), under 6,000 segments per day, low throughput |
| Sole proprietor | $4 one time | $15 per campaign, one time | $2 | No EIN, under 1,000 messages per day (T-Mobile), one phone number, one campaign |
The vetting fee is charged per campaign. Twilio describes it as one time, but a second use case is a second campaign and a second $15. Twilio’s documentation gives the sole proprietor route one campaign per brand.
These are Twilio’s figures on the date given. Other vendors set their own, and any component set by the carriers is passed through to the customer.
A worked first month for a small brand list
This is a hypothetical built from the published rates. It is an illustration, not a case study and not a customer. Picture one campaign, one leased Twilio long code and 500 single-segment texts in the month, all counted at the T-Mobile example carrier fee of $0.0045 for simplicity.
| Line | Sole proprietor | Low-volume standard |
|---|---|---|
| Brand registration (one time) | $4.00 | $4.00 |
| Campaign vetting (one time) | $15.00 | $15.00 |
| Monthly campaign fee | $2.00 | $1.50 (low end of the range) |
| Number lease | $1.15 | $1.15 |
| Segments: 500 × $0.0083 | $4.15 | $4.15 |
| Carrier fee: 500 × $0.0045 | $2.25 | $2.25 |
| Month one total | $28.55 | $28.05 |
| Month two total (one-time fees drop out) | $9.55 | $9.05 |
The same 500 sends at the segment rate alone cost $4.15. Month one under the sole proprietor route is $28.55, a gap of $24.40, so the first invoice is nearly seven times the headline arithmetic. If the low-volume standard campaign sits at the top of Twilio’s range instead, the monthly fee is $10 and month one becomes $36.55, with month two at $17.55.
By month two the fixed monthly fee and number lease outweigh the sends. A very small list is dominated by fixed costs, not the per-text rate.
Segments, not messages: where the meter actually counts
Twilio’s pricing page states the base rate as $0.0083 per 160-character segment and says SMS is billed per 160-character segment. It also says MMS is billed at a flat rate, $0.022 outbound in the US, that allows media attachments up to 5 MB and up to 1,600 characters of text without triggering multi-segment billing. So attaching an image to a message that would have been one segment moves it from $0.0083 to $0.022 before carrier fees.
Twilio’s glossary explains why 160 is the number: SMS transmits 140 bytes at a time, and GSM-7 encodes each character in 7 bits, so 140 bytes times 8 bits divided by 7 bits gives 160 characters. It adds that devices use shift tables or change to UCS-2, a 16-bit-per-character encoding, to support local languages. The page does not state the shorter per-segment limit that applies to longer concatenated messages or to UCS-2 text. [EVIDENCE NEEDED: a Twilio documentation page stating the per-segment character limit for multi-segment and UCS-2 messages.]
For a “text us for the code” flow the consequence is practical. The auto-reply carrying the code should fit within a single 160-character GSM-7 segment, and one emoji can change the encoding. Send one test and read the segment count in the message log before the post goes live.
How long approval takes, and what is not published
On the Twilio pages read for this piece, no approval duration is published. Twilio’s A2P 10DLC documentation and pricing page state none, and the help centre article on campaign approval requirements returned a page that does not render text without JavaScript, so nothing from it is used here. Telnyx’s developer documentation does state a figure for one step: it says standard brand vetting takes 1 to 7 business days, and that campaigns can be created before vetting completes, but throughput is limited until a score is assigned. That is Telnyx’s statement about its own vetting step, not a Twilio timeline. Plivo’s pricing page states none.
Twilio’s documentation does say campaigns can be rejected. In its brand-type guidance it states that when a tax ID registers more than five standard or low-volume brands, the additional brands are registered but their campaigns may be rejected at manual campaign vetting unless a clear and valid business reason is presented. On cost, Twilio’s pricing page says a failed message processing fee of $0.001 per message applies only to messages that terminate in a “Failed” status.
The order of operations follows from the blocked sending. Register before the post goes live, not after the number is printed in the caption.
What to ask a vendor before you buy a number
Each question maps to a line above. The note after each shows what the three vendors’ public pages answered when fetched on 2026-10-09.
- Is brand registration charged by you, or passed through from the carrier registry? Twilio lists a $44 or $4 brand fee. Telnyx and Plivo state none on the pages read.
- Is vetting charged per campaign? Twilio says $15 per campaign, one time. Telnyx’s docs describe vetting steps but show no fee. Plivo’s pricing page shows none.
- What is the monthly campaign fee, and which use case sets it? Twilio gives $2, or from $1.50 to $10, and does not map use cases to amounts on the pages read. Telnyx and Plivo show none.
- Is the carrier fee shown separately from the send rate? Yes on all three: Twilio shows a carrier table, Telnyx calls carrier passthrough its own line, Plivo publishes a surcharge table.
- Is number rental extra? Twilio ($1.15 leased) and Plivo ($0.50 for a long code) publish it. Telnyx’s pricing page points to numbers as a separate primitive.
- Are failed messages billed? Twilio states a $0.001 fee on Failed status only. Telnyx and Plivo state nothing on this in the sections read.
A blank on a public page is not evidence the charge is zero.
Prices verified and what this page is
Prices verified on 2026-10-09 from each vendor’s own pages: Twilio at https://www.twilio.com/en-us/phone-numbers/a2p-10dlc and https://www.twilio.com/en-us/sms/pricing/us, Telnyx at https://telnyx.com/pricing/messaging, and Plivo at https://www.plivo.com/sms/pricing/us/. This page is not Watchdog data and is not on the re-verification schedule, so figures may change without this page being updated. followedapp is published by the team behind RecurPost, which is covered vendor 34 under the same rules as every other vendor.
FAQ
Is 10DLC registration a one-time cost?
Partly. On Twilio’s page the brand fee ($44 standard, $4 low-volume standard and sole proprietor) and the $15 per campaign vetting fee are one time, while the campaign fee recurs monthly at $2 for sole proprietor or from $1.50 to $10 for the other routes. Other vendors may structure it differently, and Telnyx and Plivo publish no registration fees on the pages read.
Can a small brand without an EIN send opt-in texts?
Twilio’s sole proprietor route is written for senders without a business tax ID such as an EIN, at $4 for the brand, $15 for vetting and $2 per month, limited to under 1,000 messages per day (T-Mobile) on one phone number through one campaign. No other vendor’s rule is stated here, because no fetched page covered it.
Sources
- Twilio A2P 10DLC registration fees, fetched 2026-10-09
- Twilio US SMS pricing, fetched 2026-10-09
- Twilio A2P 10DLC documentation, fetched 2026-10-09
- Twilio glossary, GSM-7 character encoding, fetched 2026-10-09
- Telnyx messaging pricing, fetched 2026-10-09
- Telnyx 10DLC developer documentation, fetched 2026-10-09
- Plivo US SMS pricing, fetched 2026-10-09