Getting started

SMS is available on all our platform packages.

What is SMS?

The SMS channel provided by Clickatell delivers simple, scalable, bulk two-way messaging for businesses to reach their audience in 230+ territories, across 1000+ carrier networks. Available as a full services SMS Gateway or via API with multiple integration options.

SMS enables businesses to reliably offer a variety of use cases using services and features like two-way message management, short code and long number messaging, sender ID, message concatenation, data encryption, and UTF-8 encoding. SMS allows your brand to facilitate a one-way or two-way engagement directly.

Clickatell offers two SMS connectivity products: SMS APIs and an SMS Gateway*.

For more information, see:

Which SMS product option is best for me?

The table below compares Clickatell’s SMS Gateway and API products so you can easily select the one that is most suitable to your needs.

SMS APIs	SMS Gateway*
A business sending any number of messages per month	Large enterprise, aggregator, partner, or reseller sending a minimum of 250 000 messages per month
Plan on using other messaging channels in addition to SMS (WhatsApp, etc.)	SMS is the only channel you require
Require an HTTP API or REST-based API (Clickatell’s One API supports other digital channels such as WhatsApp)	Require access to specialized APIs like SMPP (in addition to standard APIs such as HTTP and REST)
Require standard and priority routing as well as standard feature controls	Require custom routing profiles and full feature-level controls
Want access to Clickatell’s Chat Flow, Chat Desk, and Campaign Manager products	Require any type of special services such as conversion APIs, custom monitoring, content registration, locale domicile pricing, etc.
Want a pre-paid or post-paid billing agreement	Want a post-paid billing agreement

NOTE: We are no longer creating new accounts for the SMS Gateway platform, except in very specific circumstances. The de facto API to use is the One API. Please reach out to our Support Team with any questions.

What applications are supported?

Once your SMS channel is activated, it will also be available to use with the following Clickatell products:

Chat Flow (automated messaging)
Chat Desk (live agent messaging)
Chat 2 Pay (payments in messaging)
One API (direct messaging)

Benefits of Clickatell’s SMS offering

Extensive global reach.
Business mobile-initiated or customer mobile-initiated SMS offering.
Cost-optimized or premium dedicated routing available.
Central management of various in-country governance requirements.
Sender ID management and registration.
Seamless number acquisition and management.
Scalable message per second capacity able to cater for large batch volumes as well as priority real-time sending.
Access to subject matter experts with global industry experience.

Channels

Find the most up-to-date information about the channels available to communicate with your clients.

Find Out More >

SMS

Enable any application, website or system to facilitate local or international one- or two-way SMS communication via an easy one-step integration with our HTTP API.