What is phone number extraction?

Phone number extraction is the process of automatically identifying and isolating phone numbers from unstructured text. Phone numbers appear in many formats worldwide—some use parentheses, others use dashes or spaces, and international numbers include country codes with plus signs. This variety makes manual extraction tedious and error-prone, especially when dealing with large amounts of text from emails, documents, or web pages.

Modern phone number extraction relies on sophisticated parsing algorithms that understand the structure of phone numbers across different countries. These algorithms can distinguish between valid phone numbers and random digit sequences, recognize country-specific formatting rules, and validate numbers against international telecommunications standards like E.164.

Tool description

This tool extracts phone numbers from any text you provide, regardless of how they're formatted. Simply paste your text containing phone numbers, and the tool will identify, parse, and list all valid phone numbers it finds. You can choose your preferred output format and optionally specify a default country for numbers without country codes.

Examples

Input text:

Contact our offices:
US Sales: (555) 123-4567
UK Support: +44 20 7946 0958
Emergency: 911
Email john@example.com or call 1-800-555-0199
Text us at 555.867.5309 for more info.

Output (E.164 format):

(555) 123-4567
+44 20 7946 0958
1-800-555-0199
555.867.5309

Output (International format):

+1 555 123 4567
+44 20 7946 0958
+1 800 555 0199
+1 555 867 5309

Features

  • Multiple output formats: Choose from International, National, E.164, RFC3966, or preserve the original format as found in the text
  • Country auto-detection: Automatically identifies country codes from international numbers, or set a default country for local numbers
  • Duplicate removal: Optionally filter out duplicate phone numbers that appear multiple times in your text
  • Real-time extraction: Numbers are extracted instantly as you type or paste text
  • Validation: Only returns valid phone numbers that match international telecommunications standards

Output formats explained

Format Description Example
International Human-readable format with spaces +1 555 123 4567
National Local format without country code (555) 123-4567
E.164 Standard machine-readable format +15551234567
RFC3966 URI format for click-to-call links tel:+1-555-123-4567
Original Preserves the exact format from the source text 555.123.4567

Use cases

  • CRM data cleanup: Extract phone numbers from messy customer data, email threads, or imported spreadsheets to create a clean, standardized contact list
  • Lead generation: Pull phone numbers from business directories, web scrapes, or marketing materials for outreach campaigns
  • Data migration: Convert phone numbers to E.164 format when migrating between systems that require standardized number formats

How it works

The tool uses the libphonenumber library, originally developed by Google for Android. It scans your text character by character, identifying sequences that could be phone numbers based on length, digit patterns, and formatting characters. Each candidate is then validated against a comprehensive database of country-specific phone number rules, including valid area codes, number lengths, and formatting conventions.

When no country code is present, the tool uses your selected default country to interpret the number. For example, "555-123-4567" would be parsed as a US number if United States is selected, or as a different country's number based on your selection.

Tips

  • Set a default country when extracting local numbers without country codes to improve accuracy
  • Use E.164 format when storing numbers in databases or APIs—it's the international standard for machine processing
  • The RFC3966 format is perfect for creating clickable phone links in HTML or markdown documents
  • Enable "Remove duplicates" when processing text that might contain the same number multiple times