Landline phone calls have traditionally been delivered over the old copper wire telephone network – this is known as the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN).
BT will retire the PSTN by December 2025 and all other landline providers will also switch over by this date. This means that in future, landline calls will be delivered over digital technology called Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), which uses your broadband connection.
At home this will mean your phone will use your WiFi router. You don’t need to do anything until your provider contacts you to tell you your service is changing.
If you rely on your landline phone and don’t have a mobile phone or signal where you live, your phone company has to give you a way to call for help during a power outage. This could be a mobile phone if you have signal, or a battery backup for your landline phone.
Other devices such as care alarms, security alarms and fax machines may also be connected to your landline. If you have a device like this, it might need to be replaced or reconfigured to continue working once you move to a VoIP service. Please check with the provider of the device
BT have a series of resources to support people with the digital switchover:
You can view a one page explainer poster here
You can watch a captioned video about the digital switchover on YouTube here