Foolproof way to figure out if someone has blocked your phone number

In this day and age where ghosting and blocking exist, it's good to know whether you've actually been blocked from someone's life - or something less personal.

First, it's important not to jump to conclusions.

It could just be a technical glitch or their phone is turned off. Here are a few ways to help you figure out if you’ve been blocked:

Listen to the type of ring when you call

Call the person you think might have blocked you but pay attention to how many rings you hear before being sent to voicemail.

If you hear multiple rings before being sent to voicemail, the person has likely missed your call.

Philippe TURPIN / Getty

And if the call goes straight to voicemail, their phone is most likely turned off.

However, if you hear only a ring or two before or voicemail interrupting the ring, it could mean your call was blocked.

You can choose to leave a voicemail but bear in mind that if your number has been barred, your voicemail won't go into their regular inbox. Instead, it will go into a separate inbox from blocked numbers.

Use a different phone

Try calling the person you think blocked you from another phone, like your work phone or a friend's phone.

If the call goes through but doesn’t when you call from your own number, you might have been blocked.

Also, if you get some type of 'unavailable' message from both your phone and someone else's phone, the person might have changed their number.

Tim Robberts / Getty

Send a text message

If you don't want to be direct and ring the person who's potentially blocked you, you can try sending a text message.

If you're on an iPhone, you can look for signs in the message.

On iMessage, if you don’t see ‘Delivered’ or ‘Read’ below your message, it could mean you’re blocked, or their phone might be in Do Not Disturb mode.

When they turn DND mode off, the message should appear for them if they haven't blocked you.

Furthermore, if your iMessage bubbles turn from blue to green, it might also mean you’ve been blocked or the person has switched to an Android device.

For Android users, it's a little harder to tell if you've been blocked via text message.

If you get an 'unable to send message' error, it could mean you’re blocked, or it could be a connection or billing issue. The trick here is to delete the contact from your phone and then search for their name.

If they show up as a 'suggested contact', it's a good chance you're in the clear. But if not, you've likely been blocked.