Latest Numbering Report Shows Small Changes

The latest Numbering Utilization Report shows that 54.7% of U.S. telephone numbers were assigned to end users as of Dec. 31, 2023, according to a Monday release from the FCC's Office of Economics and Analytics. The previous report, released in 2022, showed 52.2% were assigned to end users as of the end of 2019. The Numbering Utilization Report summarizes “an ongoing, systematic collection of comprehensive data on the utilization of telephone numbering resources within the United States” using data from carriers and VoIP providers. The latest report shows mostly small changes in number utilization rates from the 2022 version, although utilization for competitive local exchange carriers is up, from 46% to 53.1%, and the utilization rate for VoIP providers has risen from 19.8% to 32.7%. Monday's report shows more than 855 million numbers ported since wireless porting began in 2003, up 165 million from the 2022 report. OEA analyzed the report's data “as part of our ongoing assessment of the efficacy of numbering resource optimization measures prescribed by the Commission’s Numbering Resource Optimization (NRO) Orders,” the report said.