How to pick your own mobile number

​Sometimes it’s tricky to remember a four-digit PIN let alone a 10-digit mobile number, especially if you’re in the market for new mobile digits. While it’s easy enough to transfer your mobile number to a new telco, signing up for a new Prepaid plan or SIM Only plan with a new number tends to offer a handful of options that aren’t necessarily the best picks.

Thankfully, there’s a way to have greater control over a new mobile number.

The magic term for unlocking greater control over the specifics of your mobile digits is ‘premium number’. While you unfortunately can’t change your entire number—those first four digits are specific to the Telstra (0400 and 0488), Optus (0401 and 0411) and Vodafone (0404 and 0424) network carriers—the other six digits are fair game. That’s assuming you don’t mind paying.

Depending on the telco you’re dealing with that offers premium numbers, you may be dealing with terms like ‘gold’ or ‘golden’ numbers for the most coveted selections and ‘silver’ or ‘bronze’ for digit combinations that are comparatively less favourable. Premium numbers are a great way to make it easier to remember a number—for you and whomever you give it to—which makes them a great option for business mobile numbers.

Outside of offering control over those last six digits of a 10-digit mobile number, there aren’t any additional perks to having a premium number.

Before you get your hopes up for that perfect six-digit string, it’s important to understand that those numbers may already be spoken for. You’ve got a couple of options. The first is to use any number of mobile number lookup services in Australia, such as Reverse Australia or Number Lookup, but bear in mind that these sites tend to revolve around identifying spam numbers. There are also people and places selling premium numbers for a motza on sites like Gumtree, but we’d advise risking the temptation of looking at those high-priced digits.

The better option is to chat with a telco that offers premium numbers and see what’s available. Even though you have to deal with a participating telco, it doesn’t mean you need to stick with them. Shifting telcos is easy and they can’t keep your number, so don’t feel that you have to buy a plan with them and stick around just to hang onto your shiny new digits.

If you have a Telstra mobile number, you can contact Telstra to change your number. There’s a variety of different combinations to consider, but you’re either looking at $200 for Silver premium mobile numbers or $400 for Gold premium numbers with Telstra. According to our friends at WhistleOut, Telstra also reportedly offers Bronze premium numbers for $100—which is either four in a sequence, one identical triplet or two identical pairs—but you have to specifically ask for these instead of the advertised Gold and Silver options.

Check out the table below for the full breakdown of Telstra premium numbers:

If you’re in the market for a Telstra mobile number, check out the daily updating list of popular plans below:

Unfortunately, Optus isn’t as upfront about its pricing structure for buying premium numbers, and you have to contact support to discuss the specifics of the change to determine pricing. If you do reach out to Optus for a premium mobile number, ask for a Golden number, which should cost around $132.

Need an Optus number first? Check out the daily updating list below, which has popular Optus plans from our comparison engine:

Vodafone is a lot closer to Telstra than Optus in terms of its premium number service, allowing Vodafone users to pick between different combinations of Silver ($55) or Gold ($275) mobile numbers. Note that Vodafone also charges a $19.95 fee on top of this to change your mobile number. If you’re interested, contact Vodafone to start the process.

The table below breaks down the kind of combinations you can access with Vodafone Gold and Silver mobile numbers:

Check out the daily updating list of popular plans below if you’re keen on a new Vodafone mobile number:

In terms of the telcos we track in our comparison engine, there are a handful of others that let you switch numbers, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you get to control or personalise the replacement mobile number. Circles.Life charges $32 to change numbers, Vaya charges $27.50 and Amaysim asks for $20 to change numbers. TPG and Aldi Mobile recommend you reach out to support to change numbers.

Below is a daily updating list of popular plans from our database that includes the telcos mentioned on this page: