Decided to give Google voice a try and see if it’s useful for me.
If you’re not familiar with it, one new number will ring my home phone and cell. Also converts voice mail to texts. Probably other stuff I don’t know about yet.
If you’re a user, is it helpful? Work OK. Any tips to make it better?
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I use it, but just for craigslist ads for people to text to. When I signed up, I wanted to used it exactly backwards from the way it works - e.g. hoping for calls to my home phone or cell to go to GV for screening. It doesn’t, however, work that way. Damn.
I use Google phone all the time – not the same thing, apparently. I can phone any USA/Canada number, unlimited, free, from anywhere in the world where there is wifi, using my tablet.
I spend a lot of time where the cell service is not that good, so instead if missing calls. I could read voice mails on my phone rather than listening in marginal areas.
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Yes, I’ve had it for years and like it a lot. My main use is having it ring all my phones at once, as I don’t always have my mobile in my pocket, plus I get to answer the call on a land line rather than my iPhone. GV introduces a bit of latency to those conversations, but not as much as my VOIP business line or regular mobile service.
Secondarily, it lets me send and receive texts (and make calls) over a Wi-Fi connection when I’m abroad, with no mobile service. When I’m at home, I keep a GV window open on my home computer browser to more easily read and respond to texts.
A nice bonus is being able to phone my buddy in Germany for 2 cents a minute.
A bit of a bump here because I want to ask the same question: any Google Voice users?
I’m a recent convert. I got Google Voice about 2 years ago and it took a while to figure out how and when to use it, and when to use my real mobile number. It has since helped me to segregate my message traffic.
I use my Google Voice number for my LinkedIn contact, Facebook, I put it on my business cards, and on my slide deck when I give a presentation. I use it for public accounts like Safeway, Walgreens, rental car agencies, etc. On my checks. It’s on my work emails with my signature. My car and motorcycle mechanics.
I tell my wife that she can always give out my Google Voice number. I want to protect my real mobile number.
My real mobile number? That goes to friends and family, company coworkers, bank and financial accounts, my doctor — into those in my “close and immediate” circle of trust.
At home, my wife and I still have a ‘land line”. We are throwbacks. But we’re discussing dropping that and using my Google Voice number instead.
So yeah, Google Voice is pretty handy. Anybody else use Google Voice? How do you use it?
I used it for a long time, but it’s virtually idle now. The two big features for me were free texting and automatic voicemail transcribing. But since then I’ve switched to a cell plan with free texts and Android has native support for transcription. I still have my number (which is easy to remember, since I wrote a little program to search for numbers that corresponded to memorable words), but I haven’t actually used it in ages. I don’t really call people these days…
I use it for the dating app I am on. I seldom use my real number as it can be traced to my name and address.
I love it. I use it when I don’t want to give out my real number and I need a phone number for nefarious purposes.
Another bump. I use it the same way too, and it’s working very well.
I just tried googling my phone numbers. With my GV number it’s scary, the results show me, especially in the image results. With my real number, nothing.
I first signed up 3-4 years ago and wasn’t quite sure how I’d use it. I’ve been using it like @hajario, for purchases, for store clubs, etc, and it’s been working well. So far I’m happy with it.
I used it for years, and absolutely loved it. My career dragged me literally all over the US, so having just one number that I could then redirect to my local number was incredibly useful.
Then I moved to Canada, where Google Voice doesn’t really work. And I was very sad.
Okay then. I may not move to Canada. 
Oh and lately I’ve been putting GV on my business cards. That works well too.