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Introducing Yahoo! Messenger’s Call Features

What Are Messenger’s Call Features?Checking Your Voice and Sound QualitySelecting a RingtoneImporting a Ringtone

What Are Messenger’s Call Features?

With Yahoo! Messenger, you can hear voices... those of your friends. Messenger has several nifty call features that let you save money on calls to anywhere in the world. Now, while browsing the web or writing that long-awaited novel, you don’t need to cradle the phone under your chin. All you need is a headset or a microphone and speakers to talk to your friends, hands free. It’s that easy.

Here’s what Messenger has to offer in answer to all of your calling needs:

  • PC-to-PC calls—use your PC to call the PC of any friend who’s online using Messenger. This feature is completely free for both you and the friend you call.

    Tip: PC-to-PC calling isn’t supported when conversing with contacts outside the Yahoo! network, such as your Windows Live™ Messenger contacts and your Pingbox™ visitors.

  • Premium Yahoo! Phone Out users Yahoo! Phone Out—place calls from your PC to traditional phones and mobile phones in over 30 countries and at very low rates. This premium service requires a pre-paid Yahoo! Voice account. To learn more, see the Signing Up for Yahoo! Voice tutorial.
  • Premium Yahoo! Phone In users Yahoo! Phone In—get a phone number for your PC, hand it out to your friends, and let them call you on your PC using their traditional phones and mobile phones. To learn more, see the Signing Up for Yahoo! Voice tutorial.

Important: Emergency 911 calling services are not available through Messenger’s call features. Inform others who use this product that they must dial 911 through traditional phone lines or mobiles.

What’s that you say? You aren’t always available to accept calls through Messenger? Of course you aren’t. That’s why we let your friends leave voice messages when you’re not signed into Messenger or not accepting calls. You can listen to your messages using an email service of your choice. Find out more in the Setting Up Voice Messaging tutorial. Better yet, if you have the Phone Out service, forward your incoming computer calls to your traditional or mobile phone. To learn more, take a look at the Placing and Receiving Calls tutorial.

 

What’s Next

There are just a few things that you need to take care of before placing and receiving calls. Set up your PC so that you have the best listening and speaking environment.

 
 
 

Words to Know

  • Pingbox: an embedded box on a Web page where visitors to the page can send you instant messages and which lists visitors on your Messenger List.
  • Voicemail: a message left in the caller’s own voice for the intended recipient to listen to later.
  • Windows Live™ Messenger: Microsoft® Windows’ free instant messaging application.