Quick answer: A ringless voicemail to a US mobile is legal only with the recipient’s consent, outside emergencies and narrow exemptions. The FCC’s ruling FCC 22-85 (released 21 November 2022) held that a drop is a “call” made with a prerecorded voice, and telemarketing drops need prior express written consent (prior express consent for a tax-exempt nonprofit or a HIPAA health-care message). FCC 24-17 (February 2024) covers AI voices. No Commonwealth telemarketing or spam instrument, and no acma.gov.au page, names RVM.
Below is what each instrument says, in its own words. It is a reading of the texts, not legal advice.
What is ringless voicemail?
Ringless voicemail (RVM) is a recorded or machine-generated voice message deposited straight into a mobile subscriber’s voicemail box through the carrier’s voicemail server, addressed by the phone number, without placing an ordinary call that rings the handset.
The petitioner in the FCC’s 2022 proceeding, All About the Message, LLC (AATM), described its own product this way: “Our proprietary M7.7RVM software creates a landline to landline session directly to the telephone company’s voicemail server.” It argued the message was therefore not a “call”. “Ringless” is also not a guarantee: the ruling records that the consumer’s phone “may ring once before the message is delivered.” For AI outbound teams the question is newly live, because a text-to-speech model or a cloned voice can now generate a personalised drop per lead.
Is ringless voicemail legal in the US? What FCC 22-85 actually says
The FCC’s Declaratory Ruling and Order FCC 22-85 (CG Docket No. 02-278, adopted 14 November 2022, released 21 November 2022) opens with its holding:
“we find that ‘ringless voicemail’ to wireless phones requires consumer consent because it is a ‘call’ made using an artificial or prerecorded voice and thus is covered by section 227(b)(1)(A)(iii) of the 1991 Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA).”
The Federal Register notice, 87 FR 76425 (14 December 2022), gives the date in its DATES clause: “The Declaratory Ruling and Order was effective November 21, 2022.” The Commission also refused a retroactive waiver.
The reasoning is what makes the ruling hard to engineer around. The phone number is the address: it is “a necessary and unique identifier for the consumer in the ringless voicemail context”, just as it was for the internet-to-phone texts the FCC held to be calls in 2015. The route does not matter, because extra routing information “does not remove a consumer’s rights under the TCPA because ‘the effect on the recipient is identical.’” The scope is wide: a footnote applies the ruling to “any ringless voicemail technology that uses the end user’s mobile telephone number to direct the ringless voicemail message to the end user’s mobile phone.” And: “Our decision does not prevent AATM from using ringless voicemail; rather, our decision clarifies that AATM must comply with the TCPA while doing so.”
So “is ringless voicemail legal?” has a precise US answer: the technology is lawful, and sending it to a mobile number without the consent the TCPA requires is not.
The statute is 47 U.S.C. 227(b)(1)(A)(iii), which bars “any call (other than a call made for emergency purposes or made with the prior express consent of the called party)” using an autodialler “or an artificial or prerecorded voice” to a number assigned to a “cellular telephone service” and similar services. It reaches “any person outside the United States if the recipient is within the United States”, so an Australian team dropping on US mobiles is inside it. Damages, including the $500 per violation in 227(b)(3), are covered on our page on 2026 TCPA settlements and AI calling damages.
Does an AI-generated voice change the answer?
No. Declaratory Ruling FCC 24-17 (CG Docket No. 23-362, adopted 2 February 2024, released 8 February 2024) states:
“we confirm that the TCPA’s restrictions on the use of ‘artificial or prerecorded voice’ encompass current AI technologies that resemble human voices and/or generate call content using a prerecorded voice.”
Cloned voices are “‘artificial’ voice messages because a person is not speaking them”, and the ruling “makes clear that the TCPA does not allow for any carve out of technologies that purport to provide the equivalent of a live agent.” Paragraph 9 applies consent (absent an emergency purpose or exemption), the identification rules and, for telemarketing, the opt-out rules to “any AI technology that initiates any outbound telephone call using an artificial or prerecorded voice to consumers.” FCC 24-17 was issued on docs.fcc.gov, not in the Federal Register, but the Federal Register records it: the September 2024 proposed rule, 89 FR 73321, cites “the AI Declaratory Ruling in which the Commission found that AI and other technologies that generate human voices fall within the TCPA.”
Put the two rulings together and an AI-generated ringless drop to a mobile is a call made with an artificial voice. Proposals for AI-specific disclosure on each call are explained on our page on FCC NPRM 24-84 and the pending AI-call disclosure rules; a Federal Register search on 26 September 2026 found no final rule in CG Docket No. 23-362, only that 2024 proposal.
What ringless voicemail is not: the voice test, not the ring test
Most confusion comes from treating “did the phone ring?” as the legal question. We call the decision rule the voice test, not the ring test: under the TCPA, what matters is whether the message is spoken by an artificial or prerecorded voice and which kind of number receives it, not whether the handset rang. Three acts are often confused with RVM; only one escapes the artificial-voice consent rule.
- An AI call that reaches voicemail and leaves a message. Answering machine detection finds a mailbox and the agent speaks after the beep. That is an ordinary call, and under FCC 24-17 already a call using an artificial voice, so it needed consent before it dialled. For telemarketing, 47 CFR 64.1200(b)(3) adds that a message “left on an answering machine or a voice mail service” must “provide a toll free number” connecting to the automated opt-out. Detection tuning is a separate problem, covered in our guide to choosing answering machine detection settings by cost.
- A prerecorded message played on an answered call. Same rule. As FCC 24-17 quotes its 2020 Soundboard ruling, a live agent selecting the clips “does not negate the clear statutory prohibition against initiating a call using a prerecorded or artificial voice.”
- A person leaving a voicemail in their own live voice. No artificial or prerecorded voice is used, so that limb is not triggered (unless an autodialler as the statute defines it placed the call). It is still a call, and if it is a telephone solicitation the do-not-call rule in 64.1200(c)(2) applies.
A ringless voicemail is a call; a live human voice is the only thing in this list that changes which consent rule applies.
What consent does a ringless voicemail need? The threshold table
Each row names the paragraph so you can check it. Florida and California appear because they are the two states Google’s autocomplete suggested after “is ringless voicemail legal in” on 26 September 2026; other states have their own statutes, which this page does not cover.
| Jurisdiction | Message type | Consent the instrument requires | Where it says so |
|---|---|---|---|
| US (federal) | Ringless drop to a mobile number, recorded or AI voice, that advertises or is telemarketing | Prior express written consent: a signed written agreement naming the number, with the two required disclosures (prior express consent suffices for a tax-exempt nonprofit or a HIPAA health-care message) | 47 CFR 64.1200(a)(2) and (f)(9); FCC 22-85; FCC 24-17 |
| US (federal) | Ringless drop to a mobile number, informational only (no advertising or telemarketing) | Prior express consent, unless one of the four free-to-end-user exemptions in 64.1200(a)(9) applies | 47 U.S.C. 227(b)(1)(A)(iii); 64.1200(a)(1)(iii), (a)(9) |
| US (federal) | Any artificial or prerecorded voice call made for emergency purposes | None | 47 U.S.C. 227(b)(1)(A); 64.1200(f)(4) |
| US (federal) | Artificial or prerecorded voice message to a residential line, telemarketing | Prior express written consent (a tax-exempt nonprofit or HIPAA health-care caller instead falls under the call limits in (a)(3)(iv) and (v)) | 64.1200(a)(3) |
| US (federal) | Artificial or prerecorded voice message to a residential line, commercial but not telemarketing | None, if no more than three calls in any consecutive 30-day period and opt-outs are honoured | 64.1200(a)(3)(iii) |
| US (federal) | Live human voicemail that is a telephone solicitation, number on the national do-not-call registry | Prohibited unless the call falls outside “telephone solicitation” (prior express invitation or permission, an established business relationship, or a tax-exempt nonprofit caller), the caller holds a signed written agreement or has a personal relationship with the recipient, or the error safe harbour in (c)(2)(i) applies | 64.1200(c)(2) and (f)(15) |
| Florida | Unsolicited “voicemail transmission” soliciting a sale of consumer goods or services, using automated selection and dialling or a recorded message | Prior express written consent, a definition that names “the transmission of a prerecorded voicemail”; a call made at the consumer’s express request, about an unfinished debt or contract, to someone with a prior or existing business relationship, or by a newspaper publisher is not unsolicited | Fla. Stat. 501.059(1)(g), (1)(j), (1)(k), (1)(l), (8)(a) |
| California | Message sent by an “automatic dialing-announcing device” (stores numbers and disseminates a prerecorded message) | A prior agreement to receive such calls, or a live natural-voice announcement first asking consent to play the message; a device operated in California may not place calls received there 9 pm to 9 am. None of this applies to a device that does not dial randomly or sequentially and messages only people with an established relationship, or to a call the recipient requested | Cal. Pub. Util. Code 2871, 2872(c), (d), (e), (f), 2873, 2874 |
| Australia, if a drop is a “voice call” | Commercial drop to a number on the Do Not Call Register | Consent of the account-holder or their nominee, unless it is a designated telemarketing call; defences for a number cleared by a Register wash in the previous 30 days, a mistake, or reasonable precautions and due diligence | Do Not Call Register Act 2006 s 5, s 11 |
| Australia, if a drop is a “voice call” | Commercial drop to a number not on the Register | No consent under s 11; the Industry Standard still applies (calling times, identification, caller ID) | Telemarketing and Research Calls Industry Standard 2017 |
| Australia, if a drop is an “electronic message” | Commercial drop with an Australian link | Consent (express, reasonably inferred, or deemed from conspicuous publication) for every message that is not a designated commercial electronic message, whether or not the number is on the Register, plus sender information and, for non-designated messages, an unsubscribe facility | Spam Act 2003 s 16, s 17, s 18, Sch 1, Sch 2 |
| Australia | Non-commercial message (appointment reminder, debt collection, product recall) | Neither Act’s consent rule; ACMA: “If a caller is not trying to sell, promote or advertise something to you, it is not telemarketing.” | ACMA, Dealing with telemarketing |
Reading the table in one line: a ringless drop that sells something needs consent in every jurisdiction here, subject to the carve-outs each row names (US nonprofit and health-care callers, Florida and California existing relationships, Australian designated calls and messages), except an Australian drop to a number not on the Register, and that exception holds only if a drop is a voice call rather than an electronic message.
What “prior express written consent” means for a ringless drop
47 CFR 64.1200(f)(9) (eCFR, up to date as of 24 September 2026) defines it as a written agreement, signed by the person called, that clearly authorises the seller to deliver advertisements or telemarketing messages using an autodialler or an artificial or prerecorded voice, and names the number. It must clearly and conspicuously disclose that signing authorises those calls, and that signing is not a condition of buying anything. Electronic signatures count where federal or state law recognises them.
Consent also ends. Under 64.1200(a)(10) a called party may revoke “by using any reasonable method to clearly express a desire not to receive further calls”, and 64.1200(a)(11) says other means, “such as a voicemail or email to any telephone number or email address intended to reach the caller, creates a rebuttable presumption that the consumer has revoked consent when the called party satisfies their obligation to produce evidence that such a request has been made, absent evidence to the contrary”. A drop that invites call-backs should treat a voicemailed “stop” as a revocation.
Is ringless voicemail legal in Florida?
Florida wrote voicemail into its statute. Section 501.059 of the 2026 Florida Statutes defines a “telephonic sales call” as “a telephone call, text message, or voicemail transmission” to a consumer to solicit a sale of consumer goods or services, and “voicemail transmission” as “technologies that deliver a voice message directly to a voicemail application, service, or device”, which describes ringless voicemail without naming it.
Section 501.059(8)(a) bars an unsolicited telephonic sales call that “involves an automated system for the selection and dialing of telephone numbers or the playing of a recorded message when a connection is completed to a number called without the prior express written consent of the called party.” Florida’s consent definition names “the transmission of a prerecorded voicemail”, and its “signature” includes “checking a box indicating consent”. Section 501.059(5) bars further voicemail transmissions to anyone who has opted out, (8)(d) presumes a call to a Florida area code reaches a Florida resident, and (10) allows actual damages or $500, whichever is greater, trebled for wilful or knowing breaches. The pre-suit “STOP” step in (10)(c) is written for text messages only.
Is ringless voicemail legal in California?
California’s statute does not mention voicemail, so this is a reading, not a ruling. Section 2871 of the Public Utilities Code defines an “automatic dialing-announcing device” as automatic equipment that stores or generates numbers and can “disseminate a prerecorded message to the telephone number called.” Where a drop platform meets that definition, section 2873 allows use “only pursuant to a prior agreement” in which the person called consents, “or as specified in Section 2874”. The section 2874 route needs “an unrecorded, natural voice announcement” first, asking consent to play the message and saying if it “uses an artificial voice”, which a ringless drop never has anyone on the line to hear. AB 2905 added, from 1 January 2025, a definition of “artificial voice” as one “generated or significantly altered using artificial intelligence.” Section 2872(c) bars operating such a device in California to place calls received in California “during the hours between 9 p.m. and 9 a.m. California time.” The article has carve-outs: 2872(d) and (e) exempt schools, tax-exempt organisations contacting their members, cable and utility companies about arranged installations, and public-safety agencies, and 2872(f) takes out of the article entirely a device that does not dial randomly or sequentially and is used solely to message an established business associate, customer or other person with an established relationship, or any call made at the recipient’s request. A drop to a cold list gets no help from 2872(f).
Is ringless voicemail legal in Australia?
Australia has no ruling on the point, and the answer is open for a textual reason. The Do Not Call Register Act 2006 (compilation 16, the latest on the Federal Register of Legislation) defines a telemarketing call in section 5 as “a voice call to an Australian number” with one of the listed purposes, which include offering or promoting goods, services, land or business opportunities and soliciting donations. Section 4 defines “voice call” to include “a call that involves a recorded or synthetic voice”. Section 11 bars such a call to a registered number unless the account-holder or their nominee consented or it is a designated telemarketing call, with defences in section 11(3) to (5) for a number cleared by a Register wash in the previous 30 days, a mistake, and reasonable precautions and due diligence. Our page on Do Not Call Register rules for AI voice agents covers how ACMA enforces that section.
The Spam Act 2003 (compilation 10, also the latest) defines an electronic message in section 5(1) as one sent over an internet or other listed carriage service “to an electronic address in connection with” an email, instant messaging, telephone or similar account, then excludes voice calls in section 5(5): “If a message is sent by way of a voice call made using a standard telephone service, the message is not an electronic message for the purposes of this Act.” Its voice call definition has the same “recorded or synthetic voice” limb.
A ringless drop sits on that line. If it is a voice call over a standard telephone service, the Do Not Call Register Act applies and the Spam Act does not. If it is a message delivered to a telephone account without a voice call, section 16 requires consent (express, reasonably inferred, or deemed from conspicuous publication under Schedule 2) for every commercial one that is not a designated commercial electronic message under Schedule 1, Register or not. Neither Act, nor the Telemarketing and Research Calls Industry Standard 2017, addresses which it is.
ACMA has not addressed it either, as far as its own site shows. On 26 September 2026 a search of acma.gov.au for “ringless” returned “Sorry, we couldn’t find that”; the same search for “do not call register”, run the same day as a positive control, returned 47 results, so the search worked. “Voicemail” returned six results: call charges, overseas roaming, two scam-advice pages and a 2021 enforcement report. ACMA’s Dealing with telemarketing page (last updated 2 September 2026) does not mention recorded messages or voicemail. The FCC ruling does not fill the gap; as it says itself, “Another country’s construction of its laws does not bind our interpretation of the TCPA.”
For Australian numbers, the conservative reading of the text is to meet both regimes: hold consent for commercial drops, scrub against the Register, and follow the Industry Standard’s calling times, identification and caller-ID rules. Unless the account-holder or their nominee gave express consent in advance to a call at that time, the Standard bars telemarketing calls before 9 am or after 8 pm on weekdays, before 9 am or after 5 pm on Saturdays, on Sundays, and on seven national public holidays, measured at the account-holder’s usual residential address. The Standard itself is scheduled to sunset on 1 April 2027; our page on the 2027 sunset of Australia’s telemarketing standard covers what that means for AI callers.
The conditions under which the answer changes
Run these six checks, in order, against any drop you plan to send.
- Whose number is it? A US mobile number puts you under 227(b)(1)(A)(iii) and FCC 22-85. A US residential landline falls under 227(b)(1)(B) and 64.1200(a)(3); FCC 22-85 is framed around mobile numbers. An Australian number brings in both Acts above.
- Is it selling anything? Telemarketing moves US consent from “prior express” to “prior express written” (except for a tax-exempt nonprofit or a HIPAA health-care message), brings in do-not-call rules, and in Australia makes the message commercial.
- Is the voice live? Recorded, synthesised and cloned voices are all artificial or prerecorded; only a person speaking live changes the category.
- What does your consent record say? Consent to “be contacted” is not the agreement 64.1200(f)(9) describes, and Florida needs its own disclosures.
- Has anyone revoked? Under 64.1200(a)(10) and (a)(11), any reasonable method ends consent, and a voicemailed “stop” is presumed to.
- Is there an exemption? Emergency purposes, and four free-to-end-user categories in 64.1200(a)(9) (package delivery, inmate collect-call set-up, financial institutions, healthcare providers), each with conditions that include no telemarketing.
What running compliant drops actually costs an outbound team
A compliant drop programme has fixed overheads: a written-consent capture that names the number and carries the disclosures, stored per lead with timestamp and form version; a do-not-call scrub, which under the US safe harbour in 64.1200(c)(2)(i)(D) means a registry version obtained no more than 31 days before the call, plus Florida and Australian Register washes where relevant; an identification statement and toll-free opt-out number in every US telemarketing drop; and a process that writes every opt-out, voicemailed ones included, back to suppression.
None of that is specific to RVM. An AI voice agent placing a real call needs exactly the same, so a drop saves less work than it appears to, and a live AI call can hold a conversation the drop cannot. Zian’s agents work across phone, SMS, email and WhatsApp, with SmartReach AI™ choosing the channel and timing of each follow-up; the platform is in partnership-application beta. Whichever channel carries the message, that channel’s consent rules travel with it.
Ringless voicemail questions people ask
Are ringless voicemail drops legal?
In the US, a ringless drop to a mobile number is lawful only with the recipient’s consent, for an emergency purpose, or within one of the FCC’s narrow free-to-end-user exemptions. The FCC’s Declaratory Ruling FCC 22-85 states that “ringless voicemail” to wireless phones “requires consumer consent because it is a ‘call’ made using an artificial or prerecorded voice.” If the drop is telemarketing, 47 CFR 64.1200(a)(2) raises that to prior express written consent, except for a tax-exempt nonprofit or a HIPAA health-care message, which need prior express consent.
Does ringless voicemail need consent if my AI agent generates the message?
Yes. The FCC’s February 2024 ruling, FCC 24-17, confirms that the TCPA’s restrictions on “artificial or prerecorded voice” encompass current AI technologies that resemble human voices or generate call content using a prerecorded voice. An AI-generated drop is an artificial voice call, so the same consent rule applies as for a recorded one.
Is ringless voicemail legal in Florida?
Florida’s section 501.059 treats a “voicemail transmission” as a telephonic sales call, and its definition of prior express written consent expressly covers “the transmission of a prerecorded voicemail.” Section 501.059(8)(a) requires that written consent where an unsolicited call involves automated number selection and dialling or a recorded message; a call to someone with a prior or existing business relationship with the seller is not unsolicited.
Is ringless voicemail legal in Australia?
None of the Commonwealth telemarketing and spam instruments, and no acma.gov.au page we could find, names ringless voicemail. The Do Not Call Register Act 2006 defines a voice call to include “a call that involves a recorded or synthetic voice”, and the Spam Act 2003 excludes messages sent by voice call over a standard telephone service. Which label a drop takes decides which Act’s consent rule applies.
Does the Do Not Call Registry stop ringless voicemail?
In the US it is meant to. Because FCC 22-85 classifies a ringless drop as a call, a drop that is a telephone solicitation falls under 47 CFR 64.1200(c)(2), which bars telephone solicitations to numbers on the national do-not-call registry. The ruling itself notes that if these messages were not calls, the Do Not Call Registry would not protect consumers from them.
Is leaving a voicemail after an AI call rings out the same as ringless voicemail?
Legally it lands in the same place. An AI agent that dials, reaches a mailbox and speaks has already made an artificial voice call that needed consent. For telemarketing, 47 CFR 64.1200(b)(3) adds that a message left on voicemail must give a toll-free number that connects to an automated opt-out.
Where every figure on this page comes from
| Figure | Who published it | Link | Date read |
|---|---|---|---|
| FCC 22-85 adopted 14 November 2022, released 21 November 2022; RVM to wireless phones requires consent | Federal Communications Commission | docs.fcc.gov FCC-22-85A1.pdf | 26 September 2026 |
| 87 FR 76425, published 14 December 2022; effective 21 November 2022 | Office of the Federal Register | federalregister.gov 2022-26673 | 26 September 2026 |
| FCC 24-17 adopted 2 February 2024, released 8 February 2024; AI voices are “artificial or prerecorded voice” | Federal Communications Commission | docs.fcc.gov FCC-24-17A1.pdf | 26 September 2026 |
| 89 FR 73321 (10 September 2024) citing the AI Declaratory Ruling; no final rule in CG Docket 23-362 found | Office of the Federal Register | federalregister.gov 2024-19028 | 26 September 2026 |
| 227(b)(1)(A)(iii) consent rule for mobile numbers; reach to callers outside the US; $500 per violation in 227(b)(3) | US Congress (47 U.S.C. 227), via Cornell LII | law.cornell.edu 47 U.S.C. 227 | 26 September 2026 |
| 64.1200(a)(2), (a)(3) three calls in any consecutive 30 days, (a)(10), (a)(11), (b)(3) toll-free opt-out, (c)(2) 31-day registry version, (f)(9) | FCC rules, eCFR (up to date as of 24 September 2026) | ecfr.gov 47 CFR 64.1200 | 26 September 2026 |
| Florida 501.059: voicemail transmission definition, (8)(a) written consent, $500 or actual damages, treble | Florida Legislature (2026 Florida Statutes) | leg.state.fl.us 501.059 | 26 September 2026 |
| California 2872(c) no calls 9 pm to 9 am; 2873 prior agreement; 2874 natural-voice announcement, AB 2905 effective 1 January 2025 | California Legislature | leginfo.legislature.ca.gov PUC 2874 | 26 September 2026 |
| Spam Act 2003 s 5(5), s 16, Sch 2; compilation 10, 10 March 2016 | Parliament of Australia, Federal Register of Legislation | legislation.gov.au C2004A01214 | 26 September 2026 |
| Do Not Call Register Act 2006 s 4, s 5, s 11; compilation 16, 1 September 2021 | Parliament of Australia, Federal Register of Legislation | legislation.gov.au C2006A00088 | 26 September 2026 |
| Calling times: weekdays 9 am to 8 pm, Saturday 9 am to 5 pm, no Sundays or national public holidays, unless express consent was given in advance (s 8(5)); scheduled repeal 1 April 2027 | ACMA (Industry Standard 2017) | legislation.gov.au F2017L00323 | 26 September 2026 |
| ACMA site search: “ringless” 0 results, “do not call register” 47 results, “voicemail” 6 results | Australian Communications and Media Authority (search run by Zian) | acma.gov.au Dealing with telemarketing | 26 September 2026 |