Phone prefixes in Dalhousie, NB

In numbers

In-service prefixes

8

Telephone numbers covered

80,000

Carriers

5

Area codes

1

Provinces and territories

1

First assignment

February 12, 2003

Most recent assignment

April 24, 2025

Dalhousie’s share of its area code

Within area code 506, Dalhousie accounts for only 8 of 677 prefixes (1.2%): the code is dominated by Moncton and spread over 88 rate centres.

Who holds these numbers

Iristel Inc. holds the largest share at 3 prefixes, 37.5% of the total, ahead of 4 other carriers. Code by code: in 506, Iristel Inc. leads with 3 of 8 prefixes ahead of 4 others.

Wireless and wireline

1 of Dalhousie’s 8 prefixes (12.5%) are held by carriers whose registered name marks a wireless business: Bell Mobility Aliant. Wireline prefixes still outnumber them, carried by Iristel Inc, Aliant Telecom(NB), Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Cable) and TELUS Integrated Communications. This is a sort by name, not a licence lookup, and a mobile prefix may have been ported to another network since.

How the allocation was built up

Dalhousie’s dated assignments run from 2003 to 2025. The busiest period was 2015–2019, when 2 prefixes went to 1 carrier. 2 prefixes (25%) carry no date in the register: these are the historic pre-1999 assignments, the wireline bedrock of the rate centre. Since 2020 another 1 prefixes have been added, so the rate centre is still growing.

Dalhousie’s oldest prefixes, the ones the register leaves undated, belong to Aliant Telecom(NB): this carrier made up the landscape before competition arrived. The first dated assignment went to Bell Mobility Aliant in 2003. The most recent arrivals are Iristel Inc. (2016), TELUS Integrated Communications (2014) and Rogers Communications Canada Inc. (Cable) (2008), a sign that new carriers are still asking for numbers in Dalhousie.

Dalhousie has just 8 prefixes (80,000 numbers): a very small rate centre, typical of a village or rural area served by a single switching office.

No single carrier dominates Dalhousie: the leader, Iristel Inc., holds only 37.5% of the prefixes against 4 competitors, a sign of a highly fragmented market where cable companies, mobility brands and VoIP providers weigh as much as the incumbent.

Allocation is mature: only 16.7% of the dated prefixes are less than ten years old, most having been handed out in 2015–2019, and 2 prefixes go back to the undated monopoly era. New Dalhousie numbers mostly come out of blocks that were assigned long ago.

2 undated in the register.

Dialling a Dalhousie number

A single area code, 506, covers Dalhousie, and it is not overlaid with any other code on this territory: one of the few parts of Canada where seven-digit local dialling may still work. From abroad, dial +1 506 and the seven-digit number.

The numbering neighbourhood

Dalhousie shares area code 506 with at least 20 other rate centres, including Moncton, Saint John, Fredericton, Miramichi, Bathurst, Edmundston, Campbellton and Tracadie. The largest of them, Moncton, holds 79 prefixes in 506; the smallest on the list, Petitcodiac, has just 9.

What a Dalhousie number tells you

A number attached to Dalhousie tells you that its prefix was issued to a carrier for this rate centre in New Brunswick, most often Iristel Inc.. It does not tell you where the handset is today: a subscriber may have ported the number to any of the 5 carriers present here or to a VoIP service usable anywhere. Nor does it tell you who is calling: caller ID can be spoofed, and a New Brunswick area code is easy to borrow to look local.

Reading a register entry for Dalhousie: code 506-706 is recorded for Iristel Inc., so every 506-706-XXXX number (10,000 possible) descends from that assignment. “Dalhousie, New Brunswick” there names a rate centre, not a municipality.

Every Dalhousie prefix

Each row is an in-service central-office code recorded for Dalhousie, with its original holder and year of assignment.

Allocated prefixes

All 8 in-service prefixes, grouped by rate centre.

Elsewhere in New Brunswick