A call at 2pm on a Tuesday and a call at 2am should often be handled completely differently — Business Hours Routing is what makes that automatic instead of something a person has to remember to switch manually.

How it decides "open" vs "closed." You set your actual operating hours for a number, and every inbound call is checked against that schedule the moment it arrives. What happens next depends entirely on what you've configured for each state:

During open hours, a call might ring through to forwarding normally, or hand off to the AI receptionist for a live conversation.
Outside open hours, the same number can behave completely differently — going straight to voicemail, forwarding to an on-call or after-hours number instead of the daytime one, or playing a custom message explaining when you'll be back.

Set independently per number. A number that's genuinely staffed around the clock doesn't need to follow the same open/closed schedule as one that's only covered during the day — each number's hours (and what happens on either side of them) are configured on their own.

Why this matters beyond convenience. Callers who reach a business after hours and get a relevant message ("we're closed until 9am, please leave a voicemail") come away with a very different impression than callers who get the exact same daytime greeting at 11pm, or worse, a phone that just rings out.

Features at a glance

Real operating hours, set per number
Different call handling automatically applied for open vs. closed hours
Can route to forwarding, the AI receptionist, voicemail, or a custom message depending on hours
Independent schedule and behavior per number — no single account-wide setting