Google Voice adds quick redial, Caller ID option, and series of other calling tweaks

Abner Li | Jul 28 2021 - 8:51 am PT

Google today announced a handful of usability enhancements to Voice on Android, iOS, and web. The updates primarily focus on improving the calling experience.

Google Voice now tells users if a call was dropped due to poor internet connections or other “network problem.” You’re then presented with an option to cancel/end or redial (green button). If that continues to fail, you’ll be offered the “Switcher to carrier” option, with the other person still seeing your Voice number.

Meanwhile, expanding a missed call in the “Calls” tab will note if your “device wasn’t set to receive incoming calls” with a quick link to enable in settings.

The last calling-focused upgrade is to “Caller ID.” On iOS, a new setting allows people to see their Google Voice number instead of the caller’s number “when you get a call through a forwarding number.”

When this setting is on, you will see the number you linked to Google Voice as the caller ID.

Finally, Google Voice now allows you to delete multiple SMS messages at once. Google says this is a highly requested user capability:

To use this feature, simply tap on the avatar on one or more SMS threads, and a trash bin will appear on the app bar above the messages allowing the message threads to be easily deleted.

All these Google Voice features — except for the missed call reason, which is still in the process of rolling — are fully available today.