How to construct a telephone number link on Android that includes an extension

Question

On a web page I have a link to a telephone number with extension like this:

<a href="tel:[phone],123456">call now</a>

When I tap this link in an iPhone browser, the iPhone will dial 011234404 and then when the call is answered it will dial the extension 123456. This is wonderful, however it does not appear to work at all on android (the main number is dialed and the extension is ignored).

Other people seem to be using ";" or even "p" instead of the comma separator on Android with some success, but I am unable get anything to work.

What is the standard for this type of link on Android?

Witchhunt

wow that actually works? Impressive. – Disincline

Commas are used for pauses (generally about 2 seconds worth of wait time), perhaps adding more will give it a longer pause before it actually connects to the original number dialed. – Lamina

According to this RFC 3966 standard, something like this should work: "tel:[phone];extension=123456" - but it doesn't (for me). So I guess that there is just no consistent approach for this on Android... – Witchhunt

did you tried putting 'W' instead of ';' and 'p' ? – Scantling

If one of the answers below helped you to solve your problem, please consider marking it as "Accepted" by clicking the little checkbox below its score. If not, please provide us more details on what isn't working so we can help you further. – Woollen

Answer 1

Please take a look at this forum for several examples of people overcoming the problem you're describing.

Summary: It would appear that there are 2 general ways to do this.

• You can add a series of , characters, which will create a brief pause, or
• You can add a w character, which prompts the Android phone to wait for you to press a second button before it will dial the extension.

Woollen

User clearly says that the comma seperator doesnt work for Android and you're still suggesting adding , – Eduction