# How to send SMS from your own phone number with EchoCue > Send SMS from your own Android phone number through EchoCue: companion app, web dashboard and REST API. Setup steps, a working code sample and cost comparison against Twilio. Author: Nimoy Burrowes (https://nimoyburrowes.com/about) Category: Guides Published: 2026-07-04T21:00:00.000Z Updated: 2026-07-21T23:06:33.006Z Canonical: https://nimoyburrowes.com/blog/send-sms-from-your-own-phone-number-with-echocue --- Every SMS gateway I have tried has the same problem. Messages go out from a five-digit shortcode. The recipient does not recognise it. Open rate drops. Reply rate drops harder. I did not want that. I wanted the customer to see my actual phone number, the one they already have saved. So I built EchoCue. EchoCue lets you send SMS from your own phone number using your own SIM. No third-party carrier. No per-message markup. The message leaves your handset, arrives from your number and shows up in your phone's normal Sent folder. This post is the setup, end to end. **What you need** - An Android phone with an active SIM - A free EchoCue account at [echocue.com](https://www.echocue.com/?ref=dbc07c20#home) - The EchoCue Companion app installed on that phone That is it. No Twilio account. No number provisioning. No shortcode approval. If your phone can send an SMS to a friend right now, EchoCue can send it programmatically. **Step 1. Create an EchoCue account** Go to [echocue.com/register.html](https://www.echocue.com/register.html?ref=dbc07c20#home) and sign up with email and password. No card required for the Free tier. Free gives you one paired device and 10 SMS per month, which is enough to test everything in this post. **Step 2. Install the Companion app on your Android phone** Download EchoCue Companion from the Play Store on the phone you want to send from. This is the phone whose number will show up on your customer's screen. Sign in with the same email you used on the dashboard. The app needs two permissions to work: - Camera, to scan the pairing QR code - Notifications, so the backend can push send jobs to it Grant both. If you deny notifications, the phone will not receive send requests reliably. **Step 3. Pair the phone** On the web dashboard, open Devices and click Add Device. A QR code appears. Open the Companion app, tap Scanner, and point it at the QR on screen. The app registers the device in EchoCue. The device now shows in the dashboard with its phone number, model and online status. You can pair more than one, up to your plan limit. **Step 4. Send your first SMS from the dashboard** From the dashboard, click Compose. Pick the device you just paired, enter a recipient number, type a message, hit Send. The backend pushes the job to the phone. The Companion app receives it and the SMS goes out through your carrier the same way it would if you typed it yourself. The recipient sees your number. Not a shortcode. Not an alphanumeric sender ID. Your number. **Step 5. Send SMS from the API** The dashboard is fine for one-off sends. For anything real, use the REST API. Every account, including Free, gets an API key and secret. Find them in Settings → API. Send a message: POST https://api.echocue.com:5501/v1/message/sendAuthorization: BearerContent-Type: application/json{ "device_guid": "abc-123-your-paired-device", "to": "+18765550100", "channel": "sms", "message": "Reminder: your appointment is tomorrow at 2pm."} You get back a message ID and a status. Delivery updates arrive on a webhook you register, or you can poll the status endpoint. Same auth model, same request shape, whether you send one message or ten thousand. **Step 6. Wire it into Google Calendar (optional)** If you are sending appointment reminders, do not build the scheduler yourself. Connect Google Calendar in the dashboard, and EchoCue reads your events and fires an SMS at whatever offset you set (24 hours and 1 hour before is a common combo). This is the workflow I use for salons, clinics and pharmacies. The business runs their calendar the way they already do. Reminders go out from their own number. No-shows drop. **What it costs** The SMS itself uses your carrier plan, so cost per message is whatever your plan charges for SMS. In most places that is zero if you have unlimited SMS, or a few dollars (or cents) metered. EchoCue's fees: - **Free:** $0/mo, 1 device, 10 SMS/mo, full API access - **Starter:** $9.99/mo, 1 device, unlimited SMS - **Growth:** $29.99/mo, 4 devices, unified inbox, unlimited WhatsApp - **Scale:** $99.99/mo, 12 devices, 10 team seats For comparison, Twilio charges roughly $0.0079 per SMS in the US on a rented long code. For a small business sending 3,000 reminders a month, that is around $24 in SMS fees, plus number rental, plus 10DLC registration. **Limits worth knowing** - SMS sending is Android only. iOS locks down programmatic SMS, so an iPhone cannot act as a sender. The dashboard and unified inbox work on any device with a browser. - The phone has to be online. If the SIM has no signal or the phone is off, jobs queue on the backend and send when it reconnects. - Carrier throttling still applies. Most consumer plans start flagging around a few hundred SMS per hour. If you are pushing volume, spread across paired devices. - Two-way SMS works. Replies come back through the app, into the unified inbox and hit your reply webhook if you have one wired up. **Why bother** Because a message from a real number gets opened. That is the whole thesis. Every gateway tool competes on price per message. EchoCue competes on the message actually working. If you want to try it, the Free tier is enough to send an SMS from your own number end to end without spending anything. Start here: [echocue.com](https://www.echocue.com/?ref=dbc07c20#home). ## Frequently asked questions ### Do I need a Twilio account to use EchoCue? No. EchoCue sends SMS through your own phone and SIM, not through Twilio, Bandwidth or any other gateway. You do not need a separate SMS provider account. ### Can EchoCue send SMS from an iPhone? Not currently. iOS blocks third-party apps from sending SMS programmatically. EchoCue's Companion app runs on Android only. The dashboard, unified inbox and WhatsApp features work on any device with a browser. ### How does the recipient see the message? As a normal SMS from your real phone number. No shortcode, no alphanumeric sender ID. It looks the same as if you had typed it in your Messages app. ### Is there a REST API on the Free plan? Yes. Full API key and secret access is included on Free. Send limits are 10 SMS per month on Free and unlimited on paid plans. ### What happens if my phone is offline when a message is scheduled? The job queues on the backend and delivers when the phone comes back online and the Companion app reconnects. Nothing is lost. ### Does EchoCue work for WhatsApp too? Yes. WhatsApp goes through the official Meta Cloud API and does not need a paired phone. SMS uses the paired Android device; WhatsApp does not. Both land in the same unified inbox.