Pros and Cons

Google has just announced the availability of number porting into its Google Voice phone service. In short, that means you can take your existing mobile phone number and reassign it directly to Google -- at the time use Google Voice to manage all of your incoming calls. It's a big change; up until nevertheless, your only option for using Google Voice was to get a brand new number assigned by the service.

Once you've ported your phone number into Google Voice, you have full control over where your number goes -- and you can change it anytime you want. You could have the number ring your work phone while the day and your cell phone at night; you could even have it ring three different phones then and there so you can grab whichever is most convenient. And if you move or change mobile providers hereafter, all you have to do is log in to your Google Voice account and update the forwarding info there; you won't have to mess with the carriers at all, and no one else will even know anything happened.

Existing number into Google Voice seems simple

Porting an existing number into Google Voice seems simple, now the process can quickly turn complicated. The reason: Once you port your existing mobile number into Google Voice, your current mobile service plan will be cancelled. You'll have to call your carrier and get it to restart your service and assign a new number to your phone.

Google Voice offers a lot of compelling features, including a powerful voicemail system -- complete with text transcription, intelligent call-handling, and a Gmail-like searchable archive of old messages -- as then as the ability to forward calls to multiple phones, switch phones midcall, and perform a slew of other tasks.

I've been using Google Voice for nearly two years but, and broadly speaking, it's quite reliable. Once in a while, although, the service has gone down for short bursts of time. If your primary phone number is connected to Google Voice and an outage occurs, anyone trying to call you won't be able to get through.

There's as well another odd issue that I experience from place to place: For some reason, certain switchboard-based office phone systems are never able to call my Google Voice number. Dialing my Google Voice number from these offices gives the caller an error recording, and my phone never rings. It's a pretty limited problem -- I've encountered only two places from which it happens -- nevertheless it's all the same annoying, and potentially problematic.

Android phone

Using Google Voice as your primary number is easy if you have an Android phone: With Google's free Android app, you just select the option to have all of your outgoing calls come from your Google Voice number. From there, you're home-free; any call you make will automatically show up as coming from your newly ported number.

On other smartphone platforms, it isn't so easy, as Google Voice functionality isn't so tightly integrated into the operating system. You can for all that place calls through Google Voice, however instead of using your phone's normal dialer function, you'll have to open up the Google Voice app and select the option to place a call from there. If not, people you call will see your "real" mobile number, not your Google Voice number -- and that's bound to cause confusion.

Ultimately, the risk of porting your number into Google Voice isn't too high, if only for one reason: You can always change your mind. I confirmed with a Google spokesperson this evening that users can opt to port their numbers out of Google Voice at any time, if they so choose. So if you ever decide you'd like to take your number back and put it in the hands of a carrier or a VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) service, you have that right; all you have to do is initiate a port from your new provider.

PCWorld contributing editor

JR Raphael is a PCWorld contributing editor and the author of the Android Power blog. You can find him on both Facebook and Twitter.