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Sending SMS to Chinese phone numbers from abroad

Building for users in China but operating from outside the country? One thing trips up almost everyone: sending an SMS or 2FA code to a +86 number.

Why Western providers fail here

Twilio and similar aggregators have patchy or no support for China routes, and the local providers (Aliyun, Tencent) require a mainland company entity and business verification. For a solo developer or small team, that's a brick wall.

The API approach

A China-facing gateway wraps a local SMS channel behind a simple REST call — same key you use for LLM and maps:

POST /v1/sms
Authorization: Bearer <your_key>
{
  "to": "+8613800000000",
  "code": "123456"
}

No mainland company entity required for testing. Pay-per-send pricing, typically a few cents per message.

When you need this

Account verification / 2FA for China users, order or logistics notifications, any onboarding flow that texts a +86 number. It pairs naturally with the LLM and geocoding APIs — one key, one balance, three China capabilities.