Voxist: read your voicemail

Review by eFreeware

If your working day involves a steady stream of calls, Voxist is the sort of app worth knowing about. It replaces the voicemail your carrier gives you with a visual version: messages arrive as text you can read, sit in a single list, and can also be copied to email. The developer pitches it at business users and anyone fielding a high volume of calls, and that framing holds up when you look at what the app actually does.

The pitch is simple enough. Instead of dialing in and listening through a robotic menu, you open the app and see your messages, with the option to play the one that matters. Transcription is the headline, and the app handles more than 70 languages. For someone who spends hours on calls, being able to skim a message between appointments rather than listen to all of it is the whole point.

Voxist is free to install and shows no ads, which the developer promises regardless of whether you pay. It has been on Google Play since March 2019 and now sits above 100,000 installs with a 4.2 average from more than 10,000 ratings. Paid tiers exist for heavier use, and I'll come to those.

Reading your messages instead of dialing in

The core of the app is visual voicemail: every message lands in one screen, and a single tap plays whichever one you choose. The developer describes the transcription service as reliable and high quality, and it covers more than 70 languages. Whether it lives up to that billing will depend on the caller, the line quality and the language, but the concept is sound for anyone who would rather scan text than sit through audio.

The June 2026 update added three ways to view the list — audio, compact or detailed — plus a duration readout before you press play and a filter for a specific contact. Those are small things, but they matter when the list gets long. Being able to see how long a message runs before committing to it is the kind of detail that saves time on a busy day.

Transcription credits can be bought inside the app. Each tier sets a monthly allowance of transcriptions alongside the number of phone numbers and email accounts you can connect, and the higher tiers widen the language options. I'd expect most individual users to start on the free tier and move up only if the monthly limit becomes a nuisance.

Greetings, email delivery and storage

Greetings are the second pillar. You can record them or write them, so callers hear or see something tailored rather than a default recording. The app can greet a caller by name automatically, using patented technology. The practical use is straightforward: separate greetings for clients, friends and unknown numbers, and a message that makes clear to spammers they aren't welcome.

Email delivery is the other feature that stands out. Both the audio and the transcript can be sent to your inbox, and you can connect several email accounts depending on your plan. That makes messages accessible away from your phone and easy to pass on to a colleague. The recent update also lets you choose where each greeting sends its email copies, which is a sensible refinement if you run more than one address.

Storage is unlimited, with no cap on how many messages you keep. Messages are saved until you delete them, rather than expiring after a set period the way some plans do. For anyone who has lost an important message to an arbitrary retention window, that alone could be the reason to switch.

What the free tier gives you and what the paid ones add

Voxist Free covers one phone number with unlimited visual voicemail, ten transcriptions a month, one connected email account, one personalized greeting and transcription in a single language. That is a genuine free tier rather than a trial, and the developer explicitly says the ad-free experience applies to free and paid subscribers alike.

Premium runs at $4.99 a month and raises the ceiling: two numbers, thirty transcriptions, up to five email accounts, five greetings and two transcription languages.

The pattern is clear: you are paying for headroom, not for the basic service. If you take a handful of calls a week, ten transcriptions will likely be enough. If voicemail is central to how you work, the jump to Pro is where the language coverage and the larger transcription allowance sit.

Forwarding codes and the setup you can't skip

This is the part worth reading before you install. Carrier forwarding codes route missed calls into Voxist. Without it, missed calls go to your carrier's voicemail as before. The developer suggests signing up free first to check whether Voxist works with your carrier.

Coverage is limited to France, the United States except Sprint, and Bell in Canada, and the app is described as compatible with most operators on monthly plans.

One warning deserves repeating because it is easy to get wrong: if you decide Voxist isn't for you, turn off call forwarding before you uninstall.

How I'd approach it in practice

Start on the free tier and set up forwarding on your main number. Give it a couple of weeks and see how often you hit the ten-transcription limit and whether the transcripts read well for the people who actually call you. That tells you more about which tier fits than any feature list.

Record a greeting for known contacts and a separate one for unknown numbers, since the app supports both recorded and written greetings and the spam-deterrent angle only works if the greeting is specific. If you handle client calls, connect the email account you check most often so transcripts and audio reach you without opening the app.

Use the list modes to your advantage. The compact view suits a quick scan, while the detailed view with duration is better when you need to decide whether a message is worth playing in full. Filtering by contact is handy when one caller dominates your inbox.

If you run a small team or handle several lines, the higher tiers start to make sense, since more numbers and more email accounts are the main things you get for the extra spend. For a single personal number, the free tier is where I'd begin.

A voicemail replacement for heavy callers

Voxist does one job and does it in a way that suits people who live on the phone: it turns voicemail into something you read, keeps it indefinitely and copies it to email. The absence of ads and the real free tier make it easy to try without commitment, and the paid plans scale in a way that matches heavier use rather than gating the basics.

The conditions are the catch. You need to be in France, the US outside Sprint, or on Bell in Canada, you need to set up call forwarding with your carrier's codes, and you need to remember to switch that forwarding off if you ever leave. Transcription allowances are the other thing to watch, since the free tier's ten messages a month will not stretch far for someone whose phone never stops.

If you take a lot of calls and would rather skim than listen, this is a sensible app to install and test on the free plan. If your voicemail is an occasional thing, or your carrier isn't covered, the setup effort probably isn't worth it. For the high-volume caller it is built for, the trade looks reasonable.

What's new in version 1.100.2

VOICEMAILS • 3 list modes: audio, compact or detailed • Duration shown before playback • Filter by contact NOTIFICATIONS • New centralised screen (push, SMS, email) • Reliable app icon badge on Samsung • Choose where each greeting sends email copies GREETINGS • Upload your own audio greetings • Buy transcription credits in-app PERFORMANCE • 96% faster launch • Improved audio & Bluetooth playback • Bug fixes