An IVR (Interactive Voice Response) is an automated menu that callers hear when they dial a phone number. They press a digit on their keypad to reach the right person or queue — no human receptionist required.
When to use an IVR
Use an IVR when:
- You want to route calls by department (sales, support, billing) without a human operator.
- Call volume is high enough that a receptionist becomes a bottleneck.
- You need 24/7 call handling — IVRs don’t sleep.
- You want to surface self-service options before connecting a caller to an agent.
What an IVR can do
Each IVR has:
- A greeting — TTS-generated audio that plays when the call connects.
- Up to 10 menu options (digits 0-9) plus
* and # — each routes to a destination.
- A timeout — how long to wait for input before repeating the greeting.
- Max retries — how many times to repeat before hanging up.
- Optional direct extension dial — callers can dial an extension directly from inside the IVR.
Each digit can route to:
Example flow
Lifecycle
- Create the IVR with a name, extension, and settings.
- Record or generate the greeting (TTS).
- Build the menu — assign digits to destinations.
- Publish the IVR to make it live on the dialplan.
- Route a phone number (DID) to the IVR.
Changes to an IVR take effect only after you click Publish — saving alone does not update the live dialplan.
Related pages
