Sophie
1 November 2026 · 13 min read
You have a Movistar number scribbled on a scrap of paper, a Telcel contact saved during a trip to Mexico, a cousin on Claro in Colombia. You type, you hit send — and depending on the country, either the message goes through without a hitch, or it stays stuck on "not sent" with no explanation whatsoever. A text to Movistar, Telcel or Claro always goes out in international format (+52, +34, +57, +54…), without the leading zero or the local national prefix, and without ever mentioning the carrier's name: the destination network is worked out from the number alone. The cost is your French carrier's international SMS rate, generally between €0.13 and €0.30 outside your plan.
Updated 1 November 2026.
Do you need to specify the recipient's carrier?
No, never. A text message isn't addressed to a carrier but to a number. The global signalling network routes the message to the network that holds that number, querying the relevant country's portability database when needed.
It's a very widespread confusion, kept alive by the old web services labelled "enviar SMS gratis Movistar" ("send free SMS to Movistar") or "SMS gratis Telcel" ("free SMS to Telcel"), which asked you to pick the carrier from a drop-down menu. Those portals went through national gateways tied to one specific carrier — nearly all of them have shut down, and there is no legitimate equivalent today. From a French phone, there's no "carrier" field to fill in: the full number is enough.
One important point when a number has switched networks: in most Latin American countries, mobile number portability has been in place for more than ten years (Mexico, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Peru, Brazil). A "Movistar" number may therefore belong to Telcel, Claro or Entel today without anything changing in the way it's written. We go into this mechanism in detail in our article on texting a ported number.
Which country code for Movistar, Telcel and Claro?
These three brands don't correspond to a country but to groups present in several countries: Movistar is Telefónica's mobile brand (Spain and much of South America), Telcel is América Móvil's Mexican carrier, and Claro is the same group's brand across the rest of the continent. So the country code always depends on the country, never on the brand.
| Country | Country code | Main carriers | Typical local number | What to dial from France |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spain | +34 | Movistar, Vodafone, Orange | 612 34 56 78 (no 0) | +34 612 34 56 78 |
| Mexico | +52 | Telcel, AT&T, Movistar | 55 1234 5678 | +52 55 1234 5678 |
| Colombia | +57 | Claro, Movistar, Tigo | 310 123 4567 | +57 310 123 4567 |
| Argentina | +54 | Personal, Claro, Movistar | 11 1234-5678 | +54 9 11 1234 5678 |
| Chile | +56 | Entel, Movistar, Claro | 9 1234 5678 | +56 9 1234 5678 |
| Peru | +51 | Claro, Movistar, Entel | 912 345 678 | +51 912 345 678 |
| Brazil | +55 | Vivo, Claro, TIM | (11) 91234-5678 | +55 11 91234 5678 |
| Ecuador | +593 | Claro, Movistar, CNT | 099 123 4567 | +593 99 123 4567 |
These country codes come from the official E.164 numbering plan list published by the International Telecommunication Union. Three pitfalls come up again and again.
The national zero to drop. In Ecuador, Bolivia or the United Kingdom, mobile numbers are written locally with a leading 0. That zero is a national prefix: it disappears as soon as you use the country code. +593 099… is invalid.
Spain and Mexico have no zero. Spanish numbers start directly with 6 or 7, Mexican numbers with the area code (55 for Mexico City, 81 for Monterrey, 33 for Guadalajara). You simply add the country code in front: +34, +52.
Argentina's 9. This is the quirk that costs the most lost messages. To reach an Argentinian mobile from abroad, you have to insert a 9 between the +54 country code and the area code, and drop the 15 used locally. A number written 011 15 1234-5678 in Buenos Aires becomes +54 9 11 1234 5678 from France. Without that 9, the message is routed to a landline and never arrives.
What about Mexico's old "1"?
Until 2019, you had to dial +52 1 followed by the number to reach a Mexican mobile. That intermediate 1 was removed by the Instituto Federal de Telecomunicaciones (IFT, the Federal Telecommunications Institute) during Mexico's numbering reform: since August 2019, all Mexican numbers are written with ten digits, mobile and landline alike, and are dialled as +52 + 10 digits.
In practice, in 2026, many networks still accept both forms out of tolerance, but contacts saved ten years ago with +521… may fail. If a text to Mexico won't send, that's the first thing to check in the contact card.
How much does a text to Latin America cost from France?
Almost never included. French plans include texts "to mainland France" and, depending on the offer, to the European Union from France. Latin America falls outside that scope: every message is billed outside your plan at your carrier's international SMS rate.
The usual ballpark, to be checked against your carrier's current price list:
| Carrier | International SMS outside plan (ballpark) |
|---|---|
| Orange | around €0.13 per text |
| SFR | around €0.20 per text |
| Bouygues Telecom | around €0.20 per text |
| Free Mobile | around €0.15 per text |
| MVNOs (La Poste Mobile, Prixtel, YouPrice…) | varies, often €0.20 to €0.30 |
These amounts change: the official "out-of-plan rates" and "international rates" schedules are published on each carrier's website, and that's the only binding reference. An international MMS costs even more, and may fail if the recipient doesn't have mobile data switched on — see our guide on MMS not received abroad.
Two points that weigh on the bill:
- A message longer than 160 characters, or containing an emoji, is split into several texts and billed as many times. That's the mechanism we explain in why the 160-character limit exists: a single emoji switches the message to Unicode encoding and drops the limit to 70 characters.
- Outgoing texts abroad aren't capped by the same rules as data. Out-of-plan SMS charges trigger no automatic block: if you send 80 messages in a month, all 80 are billed.
Why isn't my text to Telcel or Movistar arriving?
In the vast majority of cases, the number is written incorrectly. In the rest, the blockage comes from the destination network or from an option disabled on your line.
Here's the diagnostic order that sorts out almost every case:
- Check the full international format. The number must start with
+followed by the country code, with no00, no brackets, and no mandatory hyphens. Fix the contact card, not just the input field: a number saved in local format will never go through, as explained in our article on foreign numbers saved incorrectly. - Count the digits. Mexico: 10 digits after
+52. Spain: 9 digits after+34. Colombia: 10 digits after+57. One digit too many or too few and the message is rejected by the international gateway. - Check the message centre (SMSC). If all your international texts fail while French texts go through fine, your carrier's message centre number may have been overwritten by a third-party app. On Android, it's in the phone information; on iPhone it isn't accessible, and only a network settings reset restores it.
- Ask for outgoing international service to be enabled. On some lines — capped plans, prepaid cards, business lines, offers aimed at minors — sending abroad is disabled by default. Enabling it is free and can be done from your online account or through customer service.
- Test with another number in the same country. If only one recipient gets nothing while the others do, the problem is on their end: carrier spam filter, SIM card inactive for months, or a text inbox they never check.
The special case of local spam filters
Several Latin American carriers filter incoming international texts aggressively, because it's a massive vector for fraud. A message containing a link, a string of digits that looks like a code, or a commercial keyword can be deleted silently before it reaches the phone. You get no error: your carrier did hand the message over to the partner network, which threw it away.
Practical consequence: for an important message, write in plain text, with no shortened link and no attachment, and don't try to send a verification code through this channel. That's also why SMS delivery receipts are misleading internationally: they confirm handover to the network, not that the message was read.
Are there free ways to write to a Movistar or Telcel number?
Yes, but not by standard SMS. Three options hold up in 2026, each with its limits.
IP-based messaging apps. In most Latin American countries, WhatsApp is the dominant messaging channel between individuals — more so than SMS. The message goes over data or Wi-Fi, it's free for both of you, but it requires the recipient to have installed the app and to be connected to the internet. If you don't know whether they use WhatsApp, read our article on the case where your contact only has WhatsApp.
A service for sending texts from the internet. That's what this site offers: you enter the number in international format and the message goes out to the destination network, without touching your mobile plan. You can send a text from the home page and check the rates by destination before sending. The advantage over WhatsApp: the recipient needs no app and no internet connection, just a phone that's switched on.
RCS? Not usable yet for consumer international messaging. RCS works well between two compatible phones on carriers that have rolled it out, but its coverage remains very patchy outside Europe and North America. In practice, a message to a Latin American number almost always falls back to SMS. We take stock in RCS versus SMS in France.
How to avoid nasty surprises when you often write abroad
A few habits dramatically cut failures and pointless charges.
Save all your contacts in international format, including French ones. An address book entirely in +country code works from any country, with any SIM card. It's the most rewarding setting of all: it wipes out half of all sending failures in one go. If you're rebuilding an address book from a paper list or an old phone, a small spiral notebook kept beside you avoids sloppy re-entries.
Note the country, not the carrier. "Mum – Mexico (Mexico City)" will let you work out the right format ten years from now; "Mum – Telcel" will tell you nothing if the number has been ported.
Keep an eye on out-of-plan charges. The usage tracker in your online account shows the international texts you've sent. For regular use, some carriers offer an "unlimited international SMS" option or a message bundle, often better value than per-message out-of-plan rates.
If you're travelling there, get dual SIM ready. A local eSIM for data and your French line to receive texts from your banks is the most comfortable set-up. An eSIM-compatible phone and a small SIM card adapter in your travel pouch will stop you losing the original SIM tray. Our guide local SIM abroad: your French texts are lost details the mistakes to avoid.
Check your battery life before a long journey. A message that doesn't send because the phone died is the most mundane scenario of all: a USB-C power bank in your bag solves it, and a universal mains charger with a plug adapter saves you hunting for a compatible socket on arrival.
Frequently asked questions
Is a text to Movistar Spain included in my plan?
Often not for sending from France, even though Spain is in the European Union. EU regulations cover texts sent from an EU country while roaming, not international texts sent from France to other countries. Some plans do include them explicitly: look for the wording "texts to Europe from France" in your rate sheet.
Should I write 00 or + before the country code?
The + is preferable in all cases. It's automatically translated by the network into the international exit prefix, whatever country you're in. 00 only works from countries that use it as an exit prefix, which isn't the case everywhere.
Why does my contact receive my texts several hours late?
Either their phone was switched off or out of coverage and the message was held in the queue, or the timestamp shown is the time it was sent rather than the time it was received. Both mechanisms are explained in our articles on texting a phone that's switched off and time zone differences.
Can I receive a reply on my French number?
Yes, and it's free for you: in France, receiving texts is never charged, including from abroad. It's your contact who pays for their international text. Do watch out for foreign short codes and premium-rate numbers, covered in our article on who pays when you reply to a text received from abroad.
Do "enviar SMS gratis Movistar" sites still exist?
The free national portals tied to a single carrier have largely shut down, because of abuse and spam. What survives under that name is most often data-harvesting pages. Go for an identified sending service, with published rates and verifiable legal notices, or an IP-based messaging app.
Key takeaway: the carrier's name plays no part at all. What matters is the country code, the right number of digits, the absence of a national zero — and Argentina's 9. Fix your contact cards once and for all in + format, and almost all failures disappear. For edge cases, our FAQ covers the most frequently reported situations.
