Telephone

You can make a direct call from Belarus to practically any country of the world. For international calls you have to dial "8", then wait for the tone, then dial "10" + code of the country you are calling to + area code + phone number.

NOTE: most landline telephone lines in Belarus use pulse dialing. Only some of them may use as well tone dialing.Calls to the subscribers within Belarus are made using different procedures, depending from what type of phone you are calling — landline or mobile.

Landline to landline phone: for local numbers just dial the number, for long distance dial 8-wait for the dial tone — area code — phone number.

Landline to cell phone — dial 8 — wait for dial tone — 029-XXX-XXXX

NOTE: Area codes for mobile phones are 029 and 025. If dialed from abroad zero is omitted.

Cell phones

There are four cell phone operators in Belarus. One of them operates analog NMT and digital CDMA2000 networks and the other two operate digital GSM. Networks of the providers cover mainly larger cities and highways and are not available in remote rural areas.

If you have a GSM phone it is possible that it will operate in roaming mode in Belarus. Note, however, that American GSM is not the same as European GSM (Belarusian companies use GSM 900/1800), so make sure with your provider that your phone will be compatible and will operate in roaming. Another important thing to note is that price of roaming calls is quite high and many foreign providers will charge you up to US$ 5 per minute to roam in Belarus.

It is possible to rent a cell phone while you are in Belarus. For details see the websites of mobile phone service providers (www.velcom.by,  www.belcel.by,  www.mts.by, www.best.by).

To get a subscription to a mobile service a customer normally needs a passport.

There is a quite extensive network of payphones in major Belarusian cities, however most regular payphones cannot be used for international calling. There are quite a limited number of the phones with international call option in large cities. However, international payphones would be normally available at main post offices in smaller towns.