Wifi calling won't work without cell reception?

[QmB]

I was told by a chat assistant (after they checked with someone to be sure) that WiFi calling only works if you have cell reception. Is this actually true?

The reason I want WiFi calling is because I don't have cell reception where I live. 

When I had Rebublic cell service, WiFi calling worked even without cell reception.

[Moxie]

WIFI Calling will not work if you have No (zero) Service.  

[rjniles]

"WIFI Calling will not work if you have No (zero) Service. "

Totally false. I have no over the air cell signal and my Visible WIFI calling works flawlessly.

[Jwhood31]

WiFi calling is supposed to work even without cell service. When I had T-Mobile and lived in goodspring Tennessee I had 0 coverage but my WiFi calling still worked and at this moment I have Verizon and it still works in Alabama with airplane mode turned on. It my be a WiFi antenna issue

[upstate-SC · Accepted solution]

Interesting, The purpose of wifi calling is to give you coverage when you dont have cellular connection.

Probably they meant to say that in order for the wifi calling to be activated, you may need cell reception (this may be a one time event like activation telling visible to provide cellular connection for calls, texts when you are connected to wifi internet)

So i suggest you to enable that feature in your cellphone where there is a visible coverage and try out when there is no visible coverage using wifi.

I tried wifi calling, by turning on airplane mode and then connecting to wifi. it works in iphone.

P.S: Please mark this answer as solution, if it helped you.

[QmB]

Wifi calling now works for me after a router upgrade.  Thanks for reassuring me that it should be possible!

[QmB]

Also, you were correct that I did need cell service in order to turn on wifi calling on my phone. But not after that.

[ericvisible]

I am having the same issue. Wifi calling and texts will only work if I have a cellular signal. Surely there is some workaround for this. The whole purpose of wifi calling is for when you have no cell signal.

[ericvisible]

I contacted Visible Customer Care through the chat on their website. I had some difficulty getting them to understand my issue but once they understood they "Re-provisioned" my Wifi Calling feature and had me reboot the phone. It seems to have fixed my issue.

[ericvisible]

Okay, well it appears that I may have spoke too soon. Wifi calling is still not working when I don't have a cell signal. I saw on another thread that there is (was) a known problem with wifi calling on the Google Pixel 6. I have a Pixel 4 XL with Android 13.

There is a workaround. You can turn on Airplane mode which disables the cellular port, then manually turn on wifi, and then wifi calling does work even without a cell signal.

[rjniles]

This is telling me you have a strong enough over the air signal to make a call WIFI calling. I have have found this in the past. The over the air signal is very sketchy but will try to make the over the air call. When I am home I keep my phone in airplane mode so it does not try to use over the air data or calls.

[ericvisible]

I think you are probably partially right but it is also true that wifi calling does not work even if there is NO over the air signal but the cellular port is enabled. I have verified this to be the case, at least on my Google Pixel 4 XL with Android 13. I am not the only person experiencing this so I am pretty sure it's not just me.

it's not the end of the world for me as I can live with the workaround, and I am not sure if the problem is with the phone, Android, or the cellular carrier.