Interactive voice response (IVR) solution

Build a modern IVR solution with Twilio to improve your customer experience with logic and AI-based self-service while reducing the need for agent intervention.

What’s possible with an intelligent IVR solution?

Improve your customer experience without adding complexity for agents.

  • Chat bubble with clock
    Call routing
    Route calls to the right person or department automatically to assist customers quickly.
  • Mobile notification
    Agent escalation
    Escalate calls to agents who can use context gathered by the IVR to pick up where it left off.
  • Package with heart
    Self-service automation
    Complete order processing, bill pay, appointment scheduling, and information retrieval without an agent.
  • User speech bubble
    AI virtual agents
    Deflect calls to virtual agents that can provide conversational AI experiences to save agent bandwidth.
  • Chat Bubble
    Proactive notifications
    Confirm appointments, provide critical account updates, and confirm delivery details quickly and easily.
  • Earth with a chat bubble icon
    Emergency notifications
    Make it easy for people to get critical information at scale without tying up phone lines.

How to build a modern IVR

Create a custom IVR solution to expand and modernize your contact center.

Build flows from the widget library
Start with pre-built IVR flows in our visual editor, Studio. Then customize for your business with full control over your phone tree and logic.

Iterate and adapt on the fly
Twilio makes it easy to tweak your IVR flows as new customer needs emerge or your business processes change.

Automate basic self-service tasks
Build in the ability to confirm appointments, process payments compliantly, or retrieve information without requiring agent intervention.

Twilio products for IVR

Build a modern IVR solution with a strong connectivity foundation and customize with the exact functionality you need.

Step to setup

Options

Features

Learn more

1. Phone number

  • Buy a Twilio phone number
  • Port in a phone number

200+ number types, 100+ countries

Use your existing number
 

2. Connectivity

  • Use Twilio Super Network
  • Bring your own carrier (BYOC)

4,500 global carrier connections

Use your existing PSTN carrier

3. Build

 
  • Code with TwiML
     
  • Drag and drop in Studio

<Pay>, <Gather>,
<Say> commands to
handle common tasks

Low/no-code editor, templates for IVR flows

 
Explore TwiLM                  
 

Explore Studio 
 

4. Channels

 
  • Make or receive calls with Voice APIs
     
  • Send follow-up texts with Messaging

Text-to-speech, call
recording, Voice
Intelligence and Voice
Insights

SMS, MMS, WhatsApp, reliable real-time delivery


Explore Voice 


Explore Messaging          

Build and launch your new IVR in days

Sign up for a free Twilio account to start building your new IVR flows today. Use quickstarts, up-to-date docs, the Twilio CLI, and Code Exchange to build a prototype quickly.

from twilio.twiml.voice_response import VoiceResponse

from ivr_phone_tree_python import app
from ivr_phone_tree_python.view_helpers import twiml


@app.route('/')
@app.route('/ivr')
def home():
    return render_template('index.html')


@app.route('/ivr/welcome', methods=['POST'])
def welcome():
    response = VoiceResponse()
    with response.gather(
        num_digits=1, action=url_for('menu'), method="POST"
    ) as g:
        g.say(message="Thanks for calling the E T Phone Home Service. " +
              "Please press 1 for directions." +
              "Press 2 for a list of planets to call.", loop=3)
    return twiml(response)


@app.route('/ivr/menu', methods=['POST'])
def menu():
    selected_option = request.form['Digits']
    option_actions = {'1': _give_instructions,
                      '2': _list_planets}

    if option_actions.has_key(selected_option):
        response = VoiceResponse()
        option_actions[selected_option](response)
        return twiml(response)

    return _redirect_welcome()

Build your first phone tree

Follow along with this quickstart to learn how to set up your first IVR phone tree with Twilio.

Quick deploy a basic IVR

Use our pre-built app in Code Exchange to deploy a basic IVR that uses SMS and Voice in minutes.

Tips for speech recognition and virtual agent bots with voice calling

Improve your IVR speech recognition performance with 11 best practices from our product team.

Prefer not to code? No problem.

Work with one of our trusted partners to get coding support or explore a pre-built IVR solution.

Work with Twilio Professional Services to set up global call tracking for your company

Why use Twilio to build an IVR solution

Increase customer satisfaction while reducing cost to resolution.

Start with a single IVR add-on, or modernize your entire IVR system. With Twilio, you can scale to manage huge call volumes with self-serve automation to reduce call center costs and preserve agent bandwidth.

1M+ monthly inbound calls
handled by Marks & Spencer’s new IVR

Work smarter, not harder. Add AI virtual agents with one click to offer natural language assistance, instead of rigid menus that lack context and confuse. Create customized virtual agent flows that understand caller intent.

86% of consumers
say personalized experiences increase their loyalty

There’s no need to rip and replace. Add Twilio IVR to your existing contact center to quickly expand your functionality. Then fine-tune your experience with new features or flows as you realize you need them.

97% of companies
expect to 2X their digital customer engagement investment