Cheap Calls to Ethiopia: the Best Skype Alternative
For years, the standard answer to "how do I call family in Addis Ababa without going broke?" was Skype. Buy some credit, dial the number, done. Since Microsoft retired Skype in May 2025, that answer is gone — and dialing Ethiopia directly on a mobile-operator plan remains one of the more expensive habits a phone bill can have. This guide covers what changed, how Ethiopian numbers work, the best time to call, and how eFon keeps the cost of every minute down.
Skype has hung up for good
Microsoft shut Skype down on 5 May 2025, after more than two decades. What most obituaries missed is that the feature the Ethiopian diaspora actually relied on was not video meetings — it was Skype Credit: the ability to ring an ordinary mobile or landline in another country from your computer or phone. Microsoft's designated successor, Teams, is built around meetings and chat between people who are both online. Your mother's phone in Gondar is not online. A replacement has to do what Skype Credit did:
- Call real phone numbers — any Ethiopian mobile or landline, not just other app users.
- Require nothing on the other side: no app, no account, no internet in Ethiopia.
- Charge an honest per-minute rate you can see before you dial, with no subscription.
From Skype Credit to eFon
That list happens to describe eFon exactly. You call from the app over Wi-Fi or mobile data; the person in Ethiopia picks up a completely normal call on their phone. There are no connection fees and nothing to subscribe to — you top up a balance and see the per-minute rate before you dial, and you save up to 90% compared to dialling directly on a mobile-operator plan.
Ethiopia is also not just another destination on our list. Together with neighbouring Eritrea, it is one of the routes our team has worked on for decades — the carrier relationships behind the app matter most in exactly these hard-to-call countries. That is why our rate for calling Ethiopia is consistently the best offer on the market — the live price is on that page, and checking it before you dial costs nothing.
The Ethiopian number format
Ethiopia's country code is +251. Inside the country, numbers are written with ten digits and a leading zero; when calling from abroad, drop that zero, so nine digits follow the country code. A typical mobile looks like +251 91 123 4567 — mobile numbers start with 9, or with 7 on the newer network that launched when Safaricom Ethiopia arrived in 2022. A landline in Addis Ababa looks like +251 11 518 2345, where 11 is the capital's area code (Dire Dawa, for example, uses 25).
Dialing step by step
| Calling from | You dial |
|---|---|
| Europe or the UK | 00 251 91 123 4567 |
| USA or Canada | 011 251 91 123 4567 |
| Any mobile phone | +251 91 123 4567 |
Save every Ethiopian contact once in the +251 format and you never have to think about exit codes again — in the eFon app you simply tap the contact, and the app handles the prefixes either way.
When to call: the time in Addis Ababa
All of Ethiopia is on East Africa Time, UTC+3, with no daylight saving — Addis Ababa, Gondar, Mek'ele and Hawassa share one clock year round. From Central Europe that is just one hour ahead in summer (two in winter); from the US East Coast it is seven hours ahead, so a morning call from New York lands in the Ethiopian late afternoon.
One caveat when arranging a call: Ethiopia traditionally counts the hours of the day from dawn, so what an international clock calls 9:00 is "3 o'clock in the daytime" in Ethiopian time. If a relative says "call me at three", it is worth confirming which three they mean.
A mobile-first country
The numbers tell you what kind of phone you will be calling. Ethiopia has about 135 million people, roughly 86 million mobile subscriptions — and fewer than 800,000 fixed lines (World Bank, 2024). That is more than a hundred mobiles for every landline, so the number your family gives you will almost certainly be a mobile; landlines survive mainly in offices, hotels and government buildings in the bigger cities. For you as the caller the price logic stays simple either way: one clear rate per minute, listed on the Ethiopia rates page before you dial.
Beyond Ethiopia
Families from the Horn of Africa rarely fit inside one border. The same habit — save the contact in international format, call through eFon — works for Eritrea (+291) and Kenya (+254). One app covers the whole family, wherever the lines cross.