Blink Sms

Blink SMS

Send SMS text messages from your workspace's phone number to any mobile number worldwide.

Send a basic SMS

blink sms send "+14155551234" "Your appointment is confirmed for tomorrow at 2pm."

Send from a specific number (when workspace has multiple)

blink sms send "+14155551234" "Your order #1042 has shipped!" --from "+19143720262"

Common use cases

# OTP / verification code
blink sms send "+14155551234" "Your verification code is 492817. Expires in 10 minutes."

# Appointment reminder
blink sms send "+14155551234" "Reminder: your appointment is tomorrow at 3pm at 123 Main St."

# Order status
blink sms send "+14155551234" "Your order #1042 is ready for pickup at our store."

# Payment notification
blink sms send "+14155551234" "Your payment of $49.99 was received. Thank you!"

# Custom alert
blink sms send "+14155551234" "Alert: your server is down. CPU at 98%."

International numbers

blink sms send "+447911123456" "Your verification code is 492817."
blink sms send "+61412345678" "Your order is ready for pickup."
blink sms send "+4915123456789" "Ihr Termin ist morgen um 14 Uhr bestätigt."
blink sms send "+33612345678" "Votre commande est prête."

Get JSON output (for scripting / capturing result)

RESULT=$(blink sms send "+14155551234" "Hello" --json)
MESSAGE_ID=$(echo "$RESULT" | python3 -c "import json,sys; print(json.loads(sys.stdin.read())['message_id'])")
STATUS=$(echo "$RESULT" | python3 -c "import json,sys; print(json.loads(sys.stdin.read())['status'])")

Check workspace phone numbers before sending

# List your workspace phone numbers
blink phone list

# Buy a number if you don't have one
blink phone buy --label "SMS"

Phone number format

Always use E.164 format (country code + number, no spaces or dashes):

• US/Canada: +14155551234
• UK: +447911123456
• Australia: +61412345678
• Germany: +4915123456789
• France: +33612345678
• Japan: +819012345678

Error handling

# Check if send succeeded
RESULT=$(blink sms send "+14155551234" "Hello" --json 2>&1)
if echo "$RESULT" | python3 -c "import json,sys; d=json.loads(sys.stdin.read()); exit(0 if 'message_id' in d else 1)" 2>/dev/null; then
  echo "SMS sent successfully"
else
  echo "Error: $RESULT"
fi

Common errors:

• No phone number provisioned → run blink phone buy first
• to must be in E.164 format → add + country code prefix (e.g. +14155551234)
• You're out of Blink credits → add credits at blink.new/settings?tab=usage

SMS never arrives on US phones (CLI says success, but no text)

The API returns status: "queued" when Twilio accepts the message. Delivery is separate.

If recipients on US mobile never get the text, check Twilio → Monitor → Logs → Messaging for Undelivered and error 30034 (US A2P 10DLC – Message from an Unregistered Number).

Fix (Twilio account, not the agent): Complete A2P 10DLC (Trust Hub: Brand + Campaign + link your US long code), or use toll-free SMS with toll-free verification. Until then, US carrier SMS from a normal long code is often blocked even though the CLI/API succeeded.

Command signature

blink sms send <to> <message> [options]

Arguments:
  to        Recipient phone number in E.164 format (e.g. +14155551234)
  message   SMS message text (max 1600 characters)

Options:
  --from <number>   Specific sender number (default: workspace primary number)
  --json            Machine-readable JSON output
  --help            Show this help

Response format (--json)

{
  "message_id": "sms_a1b2c3d4",
  "twilio_sid": "SMxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx",
  "status": "queued",
  "to": "+14155551234",
  "from": "+19143720262",
  "segment_count": 1,
  "credits_charged": 0.1
}

Billing

• 0.1 credits per SMS (flat rate for most messages — up to ~450 chars GSM or ~130 chars Unicode)
• Longer messages use multiple segments (153 chars/segment for GSM, 67 for Unicode/emoji)
• Credits are charged immediately when the SMS is sent, not deferred
• Check your credit balance: blink whoami