How to Call Eritrea from Abroad: Codes, Times and Costs
For the hundreds of thousands of Eritreans living abroad, a phone call home is often the only thread to family in Asmara, Keren or Massawa. Yet Eritrea remains one of the more expensive countries in the world to call. This guide covers everything you need: the dialing codes, the number format, the best time to reach someone, and how to keep the cost of every minute down.
The Eritrean number format
Eritrea's country code is +291. After it, local numbers have seven digits. A typical mobile number looks like +291 7 123 456, and a landline in Asmara like +291 8 370 362. If a relative gives you a local number starting with 0, drop that leading zero when dialing from abroad.
Dialing step by step
| Calling from | You dial |
|---|---|
| Europe or the UK | 00 291 7 123 456 |
| USA or Canada | 011 291 7 123 456 |
| Any mobile phone | +291 7 123 456 |
On a mobile, the simplest habit is to save every Eritrean contact in the international +291 format — it works from any country and from any calling app. In the eFon app you just pick the contact from your list; the app takes care of the prefixes.
When to call: the time in Asmara
Eritrea is on East Africa Time (UTC+3) all year round — there is no daylight saving. That puts Asmara one hour ahead of Central Europe in summer (two in winter), and seven hours ahead of New York in summer. If you are calling from North America, an early morning call catches family in the mid-afternoon; from Europe, the time difference is barely noticeable.
Why calls to Eritrea cost so much — and how to pay less
All telephone traffic into Eritrea terminates on a single national network, and the international termination fees are among the highest in Africa. That is why a direct call from a European or American carrier can be painfully expensive, and why prepaid calling cards eat your credit with connection fees before the conversation even starts.
eFon changes the economics. The app carries the expensive part of the route over the internet, so you pay one clear per-minute rate with no connection fee — up to 90% less than what mobile operators charge when you dial Eritrea directly from your phone plan. Check the current rate for calling Eritrea before you dial. Only your side needs internet: the person you are calling picks up a regular mobile or landline call, with no app and no data connection needed in Eritrea.
Getting good call quality
Because only your side of the call runs over the internet, call quality is in your hands:
- Prefer Wi-Fi or a solid 4G/5G signal; even 3G is enough for clear voice.
- If your home Wi-Fi is busy in the evening, switching to mobile data often helps.
- Earphones with a microphone reduce echo on long calls.
Calling the neighbours too
Many Eritrean families are spread across the region. The same approach — international format plus eFon — works for calls to Ethiopia (+251) and calls to Sudan (+249). Save each contact with the right country code once, and every call after that is one tap.