SMS API for Sierra Leone: bulk SMS to +232 numbers

Sierra Leone, a West African country with Freetown as its capital, has a growing focus on agriculture and mining. Organizations like mobile money providers, healthcare clinics, schools, and NGOs send SMS messages. These messages notify users of payment confirmations, health alerts, exam schedules, and community announcements. SMS is preferred for its accessibility, ensuring messages reach even basic phones in remote areas.

Sierra Leone

Calling code +232

Per SMS segment
$0.00787
Messages for $100
12,706
Local language
English
Encoding
GSM-7

What a bulk SMS send to Sierra Leone costs

Every message is priced at $0.00787 per segment to Sierra Leone. Texts over 160 GSM-7 or 70 Unicode characters are split into segments, so a two-segment text costs twice as much.
Messages1 segment2 segments
1$0.00787$0.01574
1,000$7.87$15.74
10,000$78.70$157.40
100,000$787.00$1,574.00

Number format in Sierra Leone

Mobile numbers in Sierra Leone have 8 digits after +232. Locally they are written with a leading 0 ((025) 123456); in the API that 0 is dropped, so the same number goes in the to field as +232 25 123456.

Alphabet and segments

English text stays inside the GSM-7 alphabet, so one segment to Sierra Leone holds 160 characters and each part of a longer text 153. Watch for curly quotes and emoji copied from other tools: one of them moves the whole text to Unicode at 70 characters per segment, and POST /v1/estimates shows the encoding before you send.

Time zone and timing

Sierra Leone keeps UTC+0 all year with no clock change, so 09:00 in Freetown is always 09:00 UTC. send_at takes UTC or any ISO 8601 offset, and the console scheduler converts from your own time zone.

Send to Sierra Leone with one request

The answer comes back at once with the message id, the country the number was matched to (SL) and the price. A delivered or failed event follows on your webhook, and a failed message is refunded.

For a list, send the same text to up to 10,000 numbers with POST /v1/batches, or a personal text per number in messages.

curl https://bulksmsapi.cc/v1/messages \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BULKSMSAPI_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"to": "+23225123456", "text": "Your Northwind code is 482913. It expires in 10 minutes."}'

What developers send to Sierra Leone

Common integrations that call the SMS API for recipients in Sierra Leone.

Payment confirmations

Mobile money services in Freetown send SMS notifications to users confirming successful transactions from their accounts.

Health alerts

Clinics in Sierra Leone send SMS reminders to patients about vaccination campaigns or upcoming health checkups.

Exam schedules

Schools in Sierra Leone send SMS notifications to students and parents about exam dates and locations.

Community announcements

NGOs send SMS alerts to residents in rural areas about upcoming events or public health initiatives.

SMS to Sierra Leone: questions

More answers on accounts, payments and the API are in the FAQ.

How much does it cost to send bulk SMS to Sierra Leone?

Each message segment to Sierra Leone costs $0.00787. A plain text of up to 160 characters is one segment, so 1,000 one-segment messages cost $7.87 and 10,000 cost $78.70. Failed messages are refunded to the balance.

How many SMS to Sierra Leone does a $100 top-up send?

$100 covers about 12,706 one-segment messages to Sierra Leone at $0.00787 each. The first top-up adds a bonus on top, which raises that number. The balance is shared by every country, so the same top-up also pays for messages anywhere else on the list.

How do I write Sierra Leone numbers for the API?

Send them in international format with the plus sign: +232 25 123456 becomes "+23225123456" in the to field. The API also accepts spaces, dashes and a 00 prefix and cleans them, and numbers that cannot be read are listed in set_aside instead of being charged.

What language should SMS messages use in Sierra Leone?

English is the primary language for SMS in Sierra Leone, as it is widely understood. Local languages may be used for specific audiences.

How can SMS reach remote areas in Sierra Leone?

SMS is ideal for reaching remote areas, as it works on basic phones and does not require internet access, ensuring broad coverage.

Start sending to Sierra Leone

Create an account, top up from $40 and send to Sierra Leone at $0.00787 per segment, from the console or with one API call.

SMS API Sierra Leone: Bulk SMS to +232 From $0.00787 | BulkSMSAPI