National Do Not Call Registry: How to Join the Do Not Call List, and What the No Call List Will Not Stop
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The short answer
Register free on the National Do Not Call Registry at DoNotCall.gov, or call 1-888-382-1222 from the phone you want listed. Registration is permanent and never expires. Your number appears on the list the next day, but telemarketers only have to scrub their calling lists every 31 days, so allow a month. The registry stops sales calls from legitimate companies. It does not stop scammers, political calls, charities, debt collectors or surveys, and it has no effect at all on where your phone number is published.
Last updated 19 August 2026. Every fact on this page comes from the FTC: its consumer FAQ for the registry, its Q&A for telemarketers on the Telemarketing Sales Rule, and its National Do Not Call Registry Data Book for Fiscal Year 2025.
How to sign up for the do not call list
There are two routes, and one of them has a failure mode nobody warns you about. Registering online does not finish when you submit the form. It finishes when you click a link in an email, and that link dies after 72 hours.
Swipe the table sideways to see every column.
| Route | Asks for | Takes | Cost | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Online at DoNotCall.gov | Your phone number and an email address | About two minutes, plus clicking the confirmation link | Free | You get an email with a link you have to click within 72 hours. Miss that window and the registration does not complete. |
| By phone, 1-888-382-1222 | Nothing except the phone you are registering | About two minutes | Free | You have to call from the number you want registered. No email step, so nothing can silently fail. |
| By phone, TTY 1-866-290-4236 | Nothing except the phone you are registering | About two minutes | Free | The TTY line for deaf and hard of hearing callers. Same registry, same effect. |
| Check whether you are already on it | Your phone number | Under a minute | Free | Go to DoNotCall.gov or call 1-888-382-1222 from that number. Registrations never expire, so most people who think they lapsed never actually did. |
The registry covers area codes across the 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa, and toll-free numbers. It holds phone numbers and nothing else. The FTC does not attach your name, address or anything else to a listed number, which is worth knowing if you were hesitating about handing over more data to solve a data problem.
Six steps, about two minutes of actual work
Registering on the national do not call list, start to finish
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Step 1
Register the number you actually want protected
If you call 1-888-382-1222, you have to call from the phone you are registering, because the line reads the number off caller ID rather than asking you to type it. Online you can register up to three numbers at once against a single email address. Cell phones and landlines work identically here. The FTC does not even record which is which, so anyone telling you cell phones need a separate registry is wrong.
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Step 2
Click the confirmation link within 72 hours if you registered online
This is the step that fails most often. The web form does not finish the job by itself: it sends an email with a confirmation link, and that link expires after 72 hours. People fill in the form, never see the email because it landed in a promotions tab, and assume they are registered. If you are not certain, check your number at DoNotCall.gov rather than guessing.
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Step 3
Give it 31 days before you judge whether it worked
Your number should appear on the registry the next day, but telemarketers are only required to scrub their calling lists against it every 31 days. A company that pulled a list the day before you registered can legally keep calling you for another month. Judging the registry after a week is the single most common reason people conclude it does nothing.
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Step 4
Ask individual companies to stop, separately
A company you have done business with can legally keep calling for 18 months after your last purchase, delivery or payment, and for three months after you make an inquiry or submit an application. That exemption ends the moment you tell them to stop. Say the words "put me on your do not call list", and write down the date. From then on their calls are violations regardless of anything else.
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Step 5
Report the calls that keep coming, at DoNotCall.gov
The FTC releases the numbers people report each business day to carriers and call-blocking companies, so a report feeds directly into the blocking tools on your phone. Include your own number, the number on your caller ID even if it looks spoofed, any callback number you were given, and the date and time. If you lost money, report it at ReportFraud.ftc.gov instead.
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Step 6
Deal with the reason your number is on a list at all
Everything above governs who is permitted to dial you. None of it governs where your phone number is published. People-search and data broker sites list your number next to your name, age, address history and relatives, and that listing is the raw material for both legal lead lists and illegal robocall operations. Removing the listing is a separate job from registering, and the registry cannot do it for you.
What the do not call registry stops, and what it does not
This is the table that answers most of the frustration. The registry has a narrow, specific job, and it does that job well. Almost every call that survives registration survives it for a reason written into the rules.
Swipe the table sideways to see every column.
| Type of call | On the registry | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Sales calls from real companies that follow the law | Stopped | This is precisely what the registry is for, and for this category it works. |
| Sales robocalls without your written permission | Already illegal | Illegal whether or not you are registered. Registering changes nothing about them. |
| Calls from scammers and spoofed numbers | Not stopped | The FTC states plainly that being on the registry "won't stop calls from scammers making illegal calls." |
| Political calls | Not stopped | Outside the FTC's telemarketing authority entirely. Not covered by the rule at all. |
| Charities calling on their own behalf | Not stopped | Exempt. A third-party telemarketer calling for a charity must honor a direct request to stop. |
| Debt collection calls | Not stopped | Allowed under the registry rules. Other laws govern them instead. |
| Genuine surveys and political polls | Not stopped | Exempt only if there is no sales pitch attached. A survey that also sells is covered. |
| Purely informational calls | Not stopped | A flight cancellation or an appointment reminder is not telemarketing. |
| Companies you recently did business with | Not stopped | 18 months after your last purchase, delivery or payment. Three months after an inquiry or application. |
| Business-to-business sales calls | Not stopped | Most calls to a business to sell to that business are exempt. |
| Marketing text messages | Covered, since the FCC codified it | The FCC extended Do Not Call protections to texting, so a marketing text to a registered wireless number is illegal without your prior express invitation or permission. |
| Your number being published on people-search sites | Not touched | The registry restricts who may call you. It has no effect on who may publish or sell your number. |
The established business relationship exemption is the one that catches people out, because it does not feel like an exemption. You bought a mattress eight months ago, so the retailer may legally keep calling you about extended warranties until the 18 months are up. The fix is not the registry: it is telling that specific company to put you on its own internal do not call list, which overrides the exemption immediately.
The part the registry was never designed to do
Why the calls continue even when the registry is working perfectly
What the registry governs
Who is allowed to dial your number. That is the whole scope. A legitimate US company that sells by phone downloads the registry, strips out the listed numbers, and takes the risk of a five-figure penalty per call if it gets that wrong.
For that category the system works, and the FTC's own numbers show it. Reports of unwanted calls in Fiscal Year 2025 were about 48% below Fiscal Year 2021, when the FTC received roughly five million of them. As of 30 September 2025 the registry held about 258.5 million active registrations.
What it does not govern
Where your number is published. Nothing in the Telemarketing Sales Rule stops a people-search site listing your mobile number beside your full name, your age, your current and previous addresses and the names of your relatives, free, on a page that ranks for your own name.
That listing is the supply side of the problem. It is what legal lead generators buy and what illegal robocall operations scrape, and the callers who cause the most damage are exactly the ones who were never going to consult a federal suppression list.
Put the two together and the picture is straightforward. Registering restricts demand from the callers who obey the law. Removing your listings restricts supply to everybody, including the callers who do not. They are complementary, not alternatives, and doing only the first is why so many people conclude the registry is broken when it is simply narrow.
Congress has started to close one of these supply channels directly. The Homebuyers Privacy Protection Act, Public Law 119-36, was signed on 5 September 2025 and took effect 180 days later, on 5 March 2026. It amends the Fair Credit Reporting Act so that credit bureaus can no longer sell mortgage "trigger leads", the alerts generated when a lender pulls your credit for a mortgage application, except to a lender that certifies an existing relationship with you or that you have opted in to. That single change addressed a well-known source of call floods, and it is a useful illustration of the general rule: the calls stopped when the data stopped moving, not when the callers were asked nicely.
The same logic applies to removing your phone number from the internet, which is the supply-side half of this problem and the one no federal list covers.
Where the unwanted calls actually land
From the FTC's National Do Not Call Registry Data Book for Fiscal Year 2025, released 11 December 2025. These are complaints per 100,000 people, which is the fair way to compare states of very different sizes.
| State | Complaints per 100,000 |
|---|---|
| Arizona | 1,028 |
| Tennessee | 1,017 |
| Nevada | 960 |
| Illinois | 943 |
| Florida | 933 |
The states that register most heavily are not the states that complain most. New Hampshire leads the country in active registrations per 100,000 people, followed by Connecticut, Vermont, Massachusetts and Kansas. None of those five appears in the complaint table beside this paragraph.
That gap is the clearest evidence available of what the registry can and cannot reach. High registration does not produce low complaint volume, because the callers generating the complaints are not consulting the registry. Robocalls, meaning calls that play a recorded message, continued to make up most Do Not Call violation complaints in FY 2025.
The topics people reported most often were calls about reducing debt, imposters pretending to be a company or agency you trust, and medical or prescription offers. All three are categories where knowing your name, your age and your address makes the pitch far more convincing, which is exactly what a people-search listing hands over.
Frequently asked questions
Does the national do not call registry actually work?
Partly, and only against one category of caller. It reliably stops sales calls from legitimate US companies, because those companies face fines of up to $50,120 per call. It does nothing against scammers, spoofed numbers and offshore robocall operations, which ignore the list entirely. The FTC itself says the registry is a list telling telemarketers what numbers not to call, and that it does not block calls.
Does the national do not call registry expire?
No. Registrations are permanent. The FTC removes a number only if the number is disconnected and reassigned to somebody else, or if you ask for it to be removed. The five-year expiry that people remember was abolished, so there is nothing to renew. If you are unsure whether you ever completed the registration, check the number at DoNotCall.gov rather than registering again.
Is the national do not call registry free?
Yes, completely, whether you register online at DoNotCall.gov or by calling 1-888-382-1222. There is no paid tier and no service to buy. If somebody calls and offers to add you to the registry, that call is itself a warning sign: the FTC advises against accepting, because the real registration takes two minutes and costs nothing.
Can I add my cell phone to the national do not call registry?
Yes. You register a cell phone number exactly the same way as any other number, and once it is listed there is no difference in how it is treated. The FTC does not even record whether a listed number is a cell phone or a landline. The chain email claiming cell numbers are about to be released to telemarketers and need urgent registration has been false for two decades.
Does the national do not call registry apply to texts?
Yes. The FCC codified that Do Not Call protections apply to text messaging, so sending a solicitation or marketing text to a wireless number on the registry without your prior express invitation or permission is illegal. That binds companies with compliance departments. It does nothing to a scam operation running toll-notice or delivery texts from rotating numbers, which is why filtering and reporting matter too. See how to stop spam texts for the setup that catches the rest.
The national do not call registry is managed by what federal entity?
The Federal Trade Commission manages it. Enforcement is shared: the FTC, the Federal Communications Commission and state officials all bring cases. The registry was created in 2003 after a three-year review of the Telemarketing Sales Rule and more than 64,000 public comments. The only official address is DoNotCall.gov.
What does the national do not call registry block?
Technically it blocks nothing. It is a suppression list: companies that sell goods or services by phone must download it and strip the listed numbers out of their own calling lists. Nothing happens on your handset. That distinction explains most of the frustration with it, because a list that callers must respect only helps against callers who respect lists.
How often must the national do not call registry be updated?
Telemarketers and sellers have to remove newly registered numbers from their calling lists at least every 31 days. That is why the FTC tells consumers to allow up to 31 days for sales calls to stop, even though a new number appears on the registry the day after you sign up. A call in that window is not necessarily a violation.
How is the national do not call registry enforced?
Through civil penalties brought by the FTC, the FCC and state attorneys general. A company that calls a registered number illegally, or places an illegal robocall, can currently be fined up to $50,120 per call, and the FTC adjusts that maximum annually for inflation. The FTC has sued hundreds of companies over unwanted calls, and telemarketers who made illegal calls have paid more than $290 million in judgments.
What are the national do not call registry exemptions?
Five categories are allowed to call a registered number: political organizations, charities soliciting on their own behalf, genuine surveys and polls with no sales pitch, debt collectors, and purely informational calls. On top of those, any company you have an established business relationship with may call for 18 months after your last purchase, delivery or payment, or three months after you make an inquiry or submit an application.
How do I check if my number is on the do not call list?
Go to DoNotCall.gov and use the verification form, or call 1-888-382-1222 from the number you want to check. Both are free and take under a minute. This is worth doing before re-registering, because the most common failure is an online registration where the confirmation email was never opened, and a check tells you that in seconds.
Why is the national do not call registry not working for me?
Usually one of four reasons. The registration never completed because the confirmation email went unopened. Fewer than 31 days have passed. The callers are exempt, most often debt collectors or a company you bought from in the last 18 months. Or, most likely of all, the callers are criminals who were never going to consult a federal list in the first place.
The other lists your details are sitting on
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