E.164 Phone Number Format

SMS campaigns in Outreach require that all destination phone numbers are in E.164 format. This is an internationally recognised standard for phone number formatting that ensures numbers are unambiguous and globally routable.

What Is E.164 Format

E.164 is a numbering standard defined by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). An E.164 phone number consists of:

1. A leading + sign
2. A country code (1–3 digits)
3. The national number (up to 15 digits total including country code)

There are no spaces, dashes, parentheses, or other punctuation.

Examples

Country	E.164 number	Breakdown
Australia	+61412345678	+61 (country code) + 412345678 (national number)
United States	+14155552671	+1 (country code) + 4155552671 (national number)
United Kingdom	+447911123456	+44 (country code) + 7911123456 (national number)
South Africa	+27821234567	+27 (country code) + 821234567 (national number)

Common Invalid Formats

The following formats are not valid E.164 and will cause contacts to be flagged as invalid:

Invalid value	Problem
0412345678	Missing + prefix and country code
61412345678	Missing + prefix
+61 412 345 678	Contains spaces
+61-412-345-678	Contains dashes
(02) 1234 5678	Local format with parentheses and spaces
+1 (415) 555-2671	Contains spaces, parentheses, and dashes
(empty)	No value provided
abc123	Contains non-numeric characters

How Outreach Handles Invalid Numbers

During the contact mapping step of the campaign wizard:

1. Outreach validates every value in the column mapped to Destination.
2. Values that do not match E.164 format are counted as invalid contacts.
3. Invalid rows are skipped; they are not included in the campaign's sendable messages.
4. The Invalid Contacts counter in the mapping panel shows how many rows were excluded.

If all rows are invalid (100% skip rate), the campaign has no sendable messages and cannot be run.

Preparing Your CSV

Before uploading your CSV to Outreach, ensure the phone number column:

• Starts each number with +
• Includes the country code
• Has no spaces, dashes, or formatting characters
• Has no empty cells (empty cells are treated as invalid)

Quick Conversion Tips

If your data has local numbers (e.g. 0412345678 in Australia):

1. Remove the leading 0
2. Prepend the country code with + (e.g. +61)
3. Result: +61412345678

Most spreadsheet tools can do this with a formula, for example:

=CONCATENATE("+61", MID(A1, 2, LEN(A1)-1))

Related Guidance

• Contacts Overview. How contacts are uploaded and mapped.
• Creating a Campaign. Full campaign wizard walkthrough.