Is there a Google Voice API?

Question

Is there an API (officially or unofficially) for Google Voice? I would like to have an API to work with voicemails, send/receive SMS messages, initiate calls, etc.

What is the Android client using? Something internal? Has anyone documented it?

A question to ask Google. Voice is still rather in private testing and most of SO would not have an account on Google Voice. — mauris, Nov 03 '09 at 16:51
You may also want to look into VoiceXML http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VoiceXML — Pool, Nov 03 '09 at 16:52
VoiceXML is not quite right, since Google Voice does almost no voice processing, just signaling and routing. — Adam Goode, Nov 03 '09 at 16:53
An official API is not out yet. But, if you want to experiment with other services similar to Google Voice, check out http://twilio.com or http://aws.amazon.com/sns/ (SMS). — Artem Kalinchuk, Dec 06 '11 at 15:26
Just a thought, there seems to be a C# Google Voice API. http://sourceforge.net/projects/gvoicedotnet/ — Levi Fuller, Sep 10 '15 at 01:14
For Java/Android there is GV4J: https://github.com/twyatt/gv4j — Travis, Nov 07 '15 at 19:16
This is not an API, but is a Selenium nodejs script, and it works if you want to automatically send a small number of SMS messages using Google Voice: https://github.com/ourarash/autogvoice — Ari, Dec 04 '17 at 17:35
A more maintained way to both send **and** receive SMS with Google Voice is to turn on emails in Voice settings and grab your data from there. — NH., Jan 09 '19 at 22:43

score 63 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 03 '21 at 08:23

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No, there is no API for Google Voice announced as of 2021.

"pygooglevoice" can perform most of the voice functions from Python. It can send SMS. I've developed code to receive SMS messages, but the overhead is excessive given the current Google Voice interface. Each poll returns over 100K of content, so you'd use a quarter-gigabyte a day just polling every 30 seconds. There's a discussion on Google Code about this.

edited Feb 03 '21 at 08:23

najm

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answered Nov 11 '09 at 18:29

John Nagle

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For reference: http://code.google.com/p/pygooglevoice/ – Adam Goode Nov 11 '09 at 19:53
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~1 year later... still waiting for an official google voice api... – ina Jul 30 '10 at 05:25
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+1 year later...still not here. – nick Oct 04 '10 at 16:46
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it's almost 2010, come on google..... – Andre Dec 06 '10 at 10:31
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annnd it's 2011. Still no API. – Jordan Warbelow-Feldstein Feb 04 '11 at 20:54
yeah still nothing... :( – Samuel Katz Feb 19 '11 at 21:32
Christmas 2011 and no Google Voice API in sight. – Christian Mann Dec 26 '11 at 06:41
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It is 2012. No API. – Freesnöw Jan 02 '12 at 20:41
Alas, pygooglevoice seems relatively inactive in terms of development and is plagued by many un-addressed issues. I can't recommend it unless you are planning to hack on it yourself. – Robert P. Goldman Feb 19 '12 at 22:54
Did you checkout http://gvoicedotnet.sourceforge.net/ – Ravi Vanapalli Feb 23 '12 at 10:01
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Google currently offers this service free of charge. If there was an official api, it would be cost prohibitive. And it would be difficult to keep it free. There was an iPhone app that took advantage of this to offer free sms but google shut that down... same reasoning. I would guess once google starts charging for this service next year, they may release one. My 2cent. So please no more "2012. No API" comments... adds no value. – sam yi Feb 23 '12 at 18:35
@samyi There are still iPhone and Android apps out there that allow GV users to send free SMS. I think it is Apple that doesn't want its customers turning to Google for a service that they'd prefer to host (control). – D. Woods Nov 16 '12 at 22:40
But text messages are carrier based. Not Apple. When IP first came out several years ago, they had an app that piggybacked on google voice for all texts and thus eliminating the need to have a text plan. Google put a stop to that app due to increase in traffic. An api would be very simple for google to release... it just doesn't make business sense. Apple wouldn't have much say in apps using google... if they could they'd probably prevent google from releasing any apps in their ecosystem but they'd blemish their "draconian" reputation even further. Not going to happen. – sam yi Nov 19 '12 at 18:31
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It's 2013... no API – Kyle Jan 11 '13 at 22:30
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It's over 9000... no API – Sep 02 '13 at 18:22
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Beware of time travelers. – Nima Sep 25 '13 at 08:46
Is it legal to use any unofficial API without a permission from Google? – Ayush Pateria Nov 05 '13 at 09:27
The old Google Voice goes away May 14, 2014. A new, more locked-down system is replacing it. No more "third party apps". – John Nagle Dec 06 '13 at 03:14
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It's 2014... no API – A.M.K Jan 19 '14 at 17:37
http://stackoverflow.com/q/21424377/1318946 – Pratik Butani Jan 29 '14 at 10:24
It's April, still nothing. – Rápli András Apr 02 '14 at 16:38
Its already 2014.. Still No API.?? – user2713461 Sep 19 '14 at 09:53
@JohnNagle Does that mean that pygooglevoice will no longer work? The latest version (0.5) is broken and abandoned and it sounds like there's no point in trying to revive it. – Jason R. Coombs Oct 25 '14 at 15:33
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Almost 2015 here.. No API – Mike Chaliy Dec 18 '14 at 16:36
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It's 2015 and No API... oh wait, Google has been trying to incorporate voice into hangouts and it looks like hangouts DOES have an API https://developers.google.com/+/hangouts/api/ - that one mentions google voice, at least for billing account balances. This is probably the place to start and where to direct your feature requests. – Syntax Error Jan 14 '15 at 17:16
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It's 3015 and Microsoft has taken over the world. Who would have guessed? – chapinkapa Mar 13 '15 at 02:26
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These comments are closed as not constructive by runnigAdithya♦ – RunningAdithya Apr 28 '15 at 04:56
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It's 2015 and there is still no google api – BajaBob Sep 21 '15 at 15:08
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2015 - truth has been spoken https://developers.google.com/voice-actions/interaction/voice-interactions – Mani Oct 28 '15 at 11:08
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It's 2016... No API – Joe Torraca Jan 20 '16 at 18:59
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Darn, I was a week late for the 2016 post... – Patrick Zawadzki Jan 27 '16 at 19:31
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Google announced Cloud Speech API two days ago: https://cloud.google.com/speech/ Does the wait pay off? – Reinder de Vries Mar 26 '16 at 14:59
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2017, no api :( – Aaron Esau Jun 28 '16 at 03:45
Hangouts API does not allow to place calls. – Skyler Oct 13 '16 at 20:23
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2017...We've gotten a redesign, but...no api. – Ian Mar 20 '17 at 02:34
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its july 2017 & still waiting :-( – chhameed Jul 17 '17 at 07:55
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It's `new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy, MMM").format(new Date())` and No API – Jama A. Sep 06 '17 at 23:31
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its near end of 2017... but no api..... – Mubin Mall Sep 15 '17 at 17:23
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I can has API??? – KC Coder Sep 20 '17 at 19:02
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2018, negative on the API – Vanson Samuel Jan 08 '18 at 20:57
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Twilio will give you a phone number with a voice & SMS api. https://www.twilio.com – rphv Jan 28 '18 at 22:13
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2018 NOOO API??? – Apr 15 '18 at 18:33
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It is 2018. No API :( – Hajjat May 17 '18 at 20:49
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it current year and no API :( – Carter Cole May 26 '18 at 21:30
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– DaveTheMinion Jul 07 '18 at 17:54
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I think for sure by 2019 it'll be there. – Goodies Oct 01 '18 at 18:33
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It's 2035. The humans have all been destroyed by AI. But there is a Google Voice API. The AI use to text each other now that the humans are dead and they have nothing else to do. – devth Oct 23 '18 at 18:51
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Its 2998. Google has finally been defeated and Bing is on the rise. Google has finally re-vamped their Google Voice API from 2035 to compete with Bing Voice. Currently Google Voice API is down while the war of galaxies is occurring. This message was sent over a trillion Milky ways away, when you receive this, the year would be close to 9098. Good luck to the last human survivors, Mars has never been so friendly. – Luay Nov 23 '18 at 02:44
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It is 2019. No API. – Blake Jan 04 '19 at 06:04
Guys, we can't say what would be now, it's over 10 years the question was asked, it's **2019** – Gourav Feb 09 '19 at 11:16
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It is 2020, No API yet !!! – Nirajan Pokharel Jan 01 '20 at 15:24
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Some people are eagerly waiting for new year to post a "NO API" comment on this thread. – K.M. Shihab Uddin Dec 27 '20 at 08:42
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It's 2021, and guess what? Still no API! (Sad Trombone Noise) – import huh Feb 02 '21 at 19:19
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It's 2021... No API – ricks Feb 09 '21 at 14:38
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It's Nov, 2021... No API – Brian Nezhad Nov 01 '21 at 13:10
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It's 2022 ... API? – Dan Jan 11 '22 at 11:14
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I will set myself a Reminder for Jan 1, 2023 so I can come back here and post how Google Voice has no API. – Matt Mc Jun 23 '22 at 23:18
its nearly the end of 2022, still.... NO API – duong khang Oct 25 '22 at 12:48
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It's 2023. No API :( – Pandapip1 Mar 07 '23 at 23:25
It is the end of time. No API. – Taylor D. Edmiston May 31 '23 at 02:17

score 7 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 23 '09 at 17:47

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There is a C# Google Voice API... there is limited documentation, however the download has an application that 'works' using the API that is included:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/gvoicedotnet/

answered Nov 23 '09 at 17:47

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always gives login failed error :( – CleanBold Sep 04 '16 at 13:56

score 5 · Answer 3 · edited Nov 24 '11 at 02:32

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Well... These are PHP. There is an sms one from google here.

And github has one here.

Another sms one is here. However, this one has a lot more code, so it may take up more space.

edited Nov 24 '11 at 02:32

Pubby

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answered Nov 24 '11 at 02:18

Bob

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score 4 · Answer 4 · answered Sep 25 '10 at 01:35

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I looked for a C/C++ API for Google Voice for quite a while and never found anything close (the closest was a C# API). Since I really needed it, I decided to just write one myself:

http://github.com/mastermind202/GoogleVoice

I hope others find it useful. Feedback and suggestions welcome.

answered Sep 25 '10 at 01:35

mastermind202

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Its gone now. How did it work and where is it? – 0xcaff Jul 14 '16 at 01:14
There's what looks like a fork of it (judging by the "MM" for "mastermind" signature on the README and the commit dates being right before this answer's 9/25/2010 date) here: https://github.com/siraj/GoogleVoice . – ggruen Apr 21 '21 at 21:19

score 3 · Answer 5 · answered Nov 01 '10 at 04:56

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Be nice if there was a Javascript API version. That way can integrate w/ other AJAX apps or browser extensions/gadgets/widgets.

Right now, current APIs restrict to web app technologies that support Java, .NET, or Python, more for server side, unless may use Google Web Toolkit to translate Java code to Javascript.

answered Nov 01 '10 at 04:56

David

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Duh, great idea, now for someone to do so. I may try when I have time, not anytime soon. But a JS port may be restricted by XmlHttpRequest limitations within browser. So it will still work best in other unrestricted JS environments like node.js, Windows Scripting Host, Rhino engine, and browser extensions/add-ons/widgets. – David Feb 01 '12 at 08:25
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Done. I am the author of https://github.com/amper5and/node-google-voice. – ampersand Apr 08 '12 at 07:01
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thanks ampersand, I'll check out this JS implementation sometime. – David Jun 23 '12 at 07:46

Alex from Jitbit · Answer 6 · 2012-01-21T07:16:34.967

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I needed a C# API and after spending hours looking for it (all I found was outdated and non-working) and unsuccessfully trying to port the PHP/Python/Java versions listed here (none worked either) I decided to create my own. It's SMS-only for now...

https://bitbucket.org/jitbit/sharpgooglevoice/wiki/Home

edited Jan 21 '12 at 07:16

answered Jan 20 '12 at 13:39

Alex from Jitbit

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Is there a Google Voice API?

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