From a nurse in Los Angeles calling her parents in Surabaya to a family in New York checking on grandparents in Medan, calling Indonesia means dialing mobile numbers that come in four different lengths, across three time zones, usually right after a WhatsApp message saying you are about to ring.
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To reach a Indonesia number from the United States, dial these three parts in order.
011 62 812 345 678
From any mobile, anywhere in the world, you can dial +62 812 345 678 instead. Press and hold 0 to type the +, and the phone picks the right access code for wherever you are.
Numbers in Indonesia are written locally with a 0 in front, like 0812-345-678. Calling from abroad you leave that 0 out, so it becomes +62 812 345 678.
Mobile numbers in Indonesia are not all the same length (this example has 9 digits after +62), so a different count is not a mistake in itself. If a call does not connect, check the start of the number against the rule above.
Only the first part changes. Your access code replaces the 011, then 62 and the number stay exactly the same.
A ~ means wait for the second dial tone before dialing the rest. It is not a digit you press.
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The US corridor is centered on Southern California. About 145,000 people in the United States identified as Indonesian in 2023, the 16th-largest Asian-origin group, and 74% of the Indonesian-alone population are immigrants; of the roughly 80,000 who identify as Indonesian alone, about a third live in California, and the largest metro communities are Los Angeles (11,000), New York (7,000) and Riverside (7,000) - Pew Research Center. Congregations anchor these communities: the first Indonesian church in the US opened in Glendale, California, in 1972, and the first Indonesian mosque was Al-Hikmah in Astoria, Queens - Indonesian Americans. US business adds steady traffic, with two-way goods trade above $37 billion in 2021 - US State Department.
Most calls into Indonesia come from its far larger Asian diaspora. Indonesians abroad are concentrated in Malaysia (about 1.3 million by citizenship), Saudi Arabia (about 858,000), Taiwan (300,000), Singapore and Hong Kong - Indonesian diaspora, and the country received about $17.6 billion in personal remittances in 2025 - World Bank. Tellingly, CelcomDigi in Malaysia uses a Jakarta number as its example of how to dial abroad - CelcomDigi.
Indonesia has no single exit code. The international prefix carries a mandatory carrier code, so lists of exit codes show Indonesia as 001, 007 or 008 rather than a plain 00 - List of international call prefixes. 001 and 008 route through Indosat and 007 through Telkom, and several operators also sell internet-based international calling on five-digit prefixes such as 01016 (Indosat) and 01017 (Telkom) - Telephone numbers in Indonesia. On a mobile, + replaces all of this: a call to the US is simply +1 and the 10-digit number, while a landline caller puts a carrier prefix such as 007 in front of the 1.
The busiest outbound routes run back along the migration paths. Families call relatives working in Malaysia, where Indonesians make up 24% of the nearly 2.5 million documented migrant workers - IOM, and in Saudi Arabia, Taiwan and Hong Kong, the other big Indonesian communities abroad. Calls to the US are a smaller stream but follow the same pattern: the exit prefix or +, then 1, the area code and the number.
Dial the exit code: 011 from a US or Canadian phone, 00 from most other countries, or simply + on a mobile or browser dialer.
Dial Indonesia's country code, 62.
Drop the leading 0: the mobile 0812-345-678 becomes 812 345 678, and the Jakarta landline (021) 5555 5555 becomes 21 5555 5555.
Dial every remaining digit without padding or trimming, because mobile numbers vary in length: 0812-3456-7890 is dialed as +62 812 3456 7890.
Remove only the trunk 0. Indonesians write it before every area code and mobile prefix, and you will sometimes see it left in, as +62 (0)812 or even +62 0812; either way it must go, leaving +62 812 - Telephone numbers in Indonesia. After +62 a mobile always starts with 8 and has 9 to 12 digits, and a landline starts with its area code, such as 21 for Jakarta or 361 for Denpasar. Short service numbers only work inside Indonesia: Telkomsel's 188, for example, has a separate +62 811 0000 333 line for overseas callers - Telkomsel.
Counting digits does not work for Indonesian mobiles. A mobile number has anywhere from 9 to 12 digits after +62, with the length set by the operator and by whether the line is prepaid or postpaid - Telephone numbers in Indonesia, so written locally with its 0 it runs from 10 to 13 digits. A short number such as 0812-345-678 is just as valid as 0812-3456-78901. Do not pad or trim a number to make it look normal; check instead that it starts with 8 after +62 and that the only thing you removed was the leading 0.
An unknown call from abroad is easy to ignore in a WhatsApp country. The Global Digital Report 2024 puts WhatsApp use in Indonesia at 90.9%, the highest of any platform - Meltwater. Big companies advertise WhatsApp lines next to their hotlines: BCA lists Halo BCA 1500888 alongside a WhatsApp number, +62 811 1500 998 - BCA. Fraud is common enough that the financial regulator OJK runs an Indonesia Anti-Scam Centre to route victims' reports to banks and e-wallets - IASC, so people are cautious about unfamiliar numbers. A WhatsApp message saying who you are and when you will call is the surest way to get picked up.
Short service numbers only work inside Indonesia. Telkomsel's call center is 188 for its own customers, but anyone calling from overseas has to use +62 811 0000 333 - Telkomsel. Treat any short hotline the same way and look for the full +62 number the company lists for overseas callers.
A phone sent from abroad may never ring. Handsets, tablets and similar devices obtained outside Indonesia must have their IMEI registered to get service on Indonesian mobile networks - Bea Cukai. If you mailed or carried a phone to a relative and your calls never get through, an unregistered IMEI is a likely culprit, and the fix happens in Indonesia, not on your end.
Landline area codes get longer as you move away from the biggest cities. Jakarta is 021, a code shared with Tangerang, Bekasi and Depok, Bandung is 022, Surabaya 031 and Medan 061, while other cities use three digits after the 0, such as 0274 for Yogyakarta, 0361 for Denpasar and 0411 for Makassar. Local numbers are 8 digits in the large cities and 7 elsewhere, so a Jakarta landline written (021) 5555 5555 becomes +62 21 5555 5555 - Telephone numbers in Indonesia.
Mobiles never use area codes. They start with 08, and the first four digits show the operator that issued the number: 0811 to 0813, 0821 to 0823 and 0851 to 0853 for Telkomsel, 0814 to 0816 and 0855 to 0858 for Indosat's IM3, 0895 to 0899 for Tri, 0817 to 0819, 0859, 0877 and 0878 for XL, 0831 to 0833 and 0838 for AXIS and 0881 to 0889 for Smartfren - Telephone numbers in Indonesia.
Because length varies by operator and type of line, two valid numbers in the same family can differ by two or three digits. When you save an Indonesian contact, copy every digit exactly as given, replace the leading 0 with +62, and do not try to make two numbers match in length.
Indonesia spans three official zones, and none of them uses daylight saving time. WIB (UTC+7) covers Sumatra, Java and West and Central Kalimantan; WITA (UTC+8) covers Bali, West and East Nusa Tenggara, all of Sulawesi and South, East and North Kalimantan; and WIT (UTC+9) covers Maluku and the Papua provinces. The zones have had their current shape since 1 January 1988 - Time in Indonesia.
So a hotel in Bali or Lombok is an hour ahead of an office in Jakarta, and Jayapura is two hours ahead. From the US East Coast during American daylight saving time, Jakarta is 11 hours ahead, Bali 12 and Papua 13; in the US winter add one hour to each, because Indonesia never changes its clocks - time.is. A 9am call from New York in July reaches Jakarta at 8pm, Bali at 9pm and Jayapura at 10pm.
The weekend is Saturday and Sunday. Friday midday is a poor time to reach many men, who attend Friday prayers, and the working day in government offices and banks follows local time in each zone, so an 8am start in Makassar comes an hour before an 8am start in Jakarta.
Indonesia's mobile market has consolidated into three groups. Telkomsel, owned by Telkom Indonesia (69.9%) and Singapore's Singtel (30.1%), is the country's largest cellular operator - Telkomsel. Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison was created when Indosat Ooredoo merged with Hutchison 3 Indonesia, closing on 4 January 2022 and putting the IM3 and Tri brands under one roof - Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison. XLSmart followed on 16 April 2025, when XL Axiata and Smartfren completed their merger - XL Axiata, and it keeps XL, AXIS and Smartfren as separate brands - XLSMART.
None of this changes how you dial: a 0881 Smartfren number is +62 881 and the rest, and a 0895 Tri number is +62 895 and the rest. The prefixes still show which brand issued a number, even though Smartfren and AXIS now sit in the same company as XL.
Indonesia counted about 356 million cellular connections in early 2025, around 125% of the population - DataReportal, which suggests many people carry more than one SIM. Before an important call, ask which number is in the phone they actually carry, and which one is linked to their WhatsApp.
The Islamic calendar shapes when Indonesians are free to talk. During Ramadan most families fast from dawn to sunset, so the hour around the evening meal that breaks the fast is a bad time to ring, while later in the evening is usually relaxed. Ramadan moves about 11 days earlier each year, so check the dates before planning a call.
Just before Lebaran (Eid al-Fitr), migrants all over Indonesia return to their home towns and villages in the annual mudik, which set a record of 193 million participants in 2024 - Mudik. Lebaran itself is when families gather, and a call from abroad during those days can reach parents, siblings and cousins in one room.
The same exodus means the person you want may not be near their landline. If you usually call a relative's 021 home number in Jakarta, try their mobile during the mudik weeks instead, since the family may be hundreds of kilometers away in its home village.
Indonesia's emergency services use short 11x numbers: 110 for the police, 113 for the fire service, 115 for search and rescue, 118 or 119 for an ambulance and 112 as the emergency number on mobile and satellite phones - Telephone numbers in Indonesia. These work only from a phone inside Indonesia, so in an emergency call your relative's own mobile and let someone on the spot dial.
Business cards and shop signs add their own shorthand. A number marked HP (hand phone) is a mobile, and a number marked hunting is an office line that rolls over to the next free line so the company can publish a single number - Telephone numbers in Indonesia. A hunting number is dialed like any landline: +62, then the area code without its 0, then the local digits.
Short service numbers are different again. Telkomsel's 188 serves callers inside Indonesia and the company lists a separate +62 number for overseas callers, so treat other short codes, such as BCA's 1500888, with the same caution: when a business gives you only a short code, ask for a regular +62 landline, a mobile or its WhatsApp line instead.
Indonesia's country code is +62, and yes, drop the leading 0. The mobile 0812-345-678 becomes +62 812 345 678, and the Jakarta landline (021) 5555 5555 becomes +62 21 5555 5555. Never dial +62 0; from a US landline, dial 011 62 and then the number without its 0.
There is no single answer. Indonesian mobiles have 9 to 12 digits after +62, depending on the operator and on whether the line is prepaid or postpaid - Telephone numbers in Indonesia, which is 10 to 13 digits when written locally with the 0. Both 0812-345-678 and 0812-3456-7890 can be correct, so copy the number exactly and drop only the leading 0.
It depends on the island. Jakarta and Java are on UTC+7, Bali and Sulawesi on UTC+8 and Papua on UTC+9, with no daylight saving time anywhere - Time in Indonesia. During US daylight saving time Jakarta is 11 hours ahead of New York and 14 ahead of Los Angeles; from November to March add an hour.
Most likely its IMEI is not registered. Phones, tablets and similar devices obtained outside Indonesia must have their IMEI registered to use Indonesian mobile networks - Bea Cukai. Until that is done, an Indonesian SIM in that handset will not connect, so your calls cannot reach it. Your relative needs to register the device in Indonesia.
No. Short service numbers are for callers inside Indonesia. Telkomsel, for example, uses 188 for its own customers but lists +62 811 0000 333 for anyone calling from overseas - Telkomsel. For banks and airlines, look for the full +62 number or an official WhatsApp line on the company's website.
Unknown international numbers are easy to ignore in a country where WhatsApp use stands at 90.9% - Meltwater and scams are common enough that the regulator runs a national Anti-Scam Centre - IASC. Send a WhatsApp message first with your name and the time you will call, and check the time zone: evening in Jakarta is morning on the US East Coast.
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