Don’t remember someone’s number? Here’s how to use T9 Dialing on iPhone instead

I don’t know my wife’s phone number. If I needed to call her and I didn’t have my iPhone, I wouldn’t be able to reach her. According to a survey he conducted WhistleI’m not alone. About 17% of participants said they did not know their partner’s phone number, and less than 20% of participants said they knew more than six phone numbers. But if you need to make a call on your iPhoneYou can use T9 dialing to find your contact’s name instead of saving their numbers.

Apple introduced the T9 calling feature for all iPhones when the tech giant released iOS 18 in 2024. With T9 calling, you can call someone just by typing their name in the Phone app of your iPhone. This means you don’t have to memorize phone numbers or dig through your contacts to call them.

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Here’s everything you need to know about calling T9 and how to use it on your iPhone.

What exactly is T9 communication?

T9 stands for text on nine keys. Before cell phones had full keypads, many phones had 12 keys. These were for the numbers zero to nine, the star and the pound sign or hashtag. I felt old just writing that. To message someone, you mostly use the nine numbered keys. Each numbered key had three or four corresponding letters appended to it, with the zero key being the space bar and the single key being blank.

If you go to your Phone app and tap the keyboard at the bottom of your screen, you can see the corresponding numbers and letters there. Initially, if you wanted to type “Hello,” you had to press 44(H)-33(E)-555(L)-555(L)-666(0). That’s a lot of writing for one fairly short word. T9 texting was introduced as an early form of predictive typing. It allows you to press fewer keys and send messages faster. So for “Hello”, type 4-3-5-5-6. Much easier.

How to use T9 calling on iPhone

With iOS 18, you can now use T9 dialing to make calls. Here’s how.

1. Open the Contacts app on your iPhone.
2. handle keyboard At the bottom of the screen.

From here, start typing the name of the person you want to contact using T9 principles. So, if you want to call dad, type 3-2-3 in your keyboard, and for mom, type 6-6-6, but there’s nothing to worry about, I promise. Their name should appear at the top of the screen. As you type, a backspace button will appear below the pound sign/hashtag if you make a mistake. Press it as many times as needed. Note that there is no spacebar. Once you find the person, click on their name and their phone number will be automatically entered. Then press the green connect button, and you’re good to go.

If there’s more than one person in your Contacts app with a certain name, as you type you’ll see an option below the top result that says something like “3 more…” Tap that to open a new list containing all the corresponding contacts. Then press the call button next to the correct contact and your call will start immediately. Be prepared to explain why you are calling the other person and not just texting them.

For more iOS news, here My review of iOS 26In addition to how to reduce the effects of liquid glass and how to do so Block annoying calls In the update. You can also check our website iOS 26 cheat sheet.