Phone prefixes in Yellowknife, NT

In numbers

In-service prefixes

35

Telephone numbers covered

350,000

Carriers

6

Area codes

1

Provinces and territories

1

First assignment

February 21, 2003

Most recent assignment

May 8, 2025

Yellowknife’s share of its area code

Within area code 867, Yellowknife takes 35 of 258 prefixes (13.6%), a substantial slice of a code shared by 75 rate centres, the largest of them Yellowknife.

Who holds these numbers

Bell Mobility holds the largest share at 12 prefixes, 34.3% of the total, ahead of 5 other carriers. Code by code: in 867, Bell Mobility leads with 12 of 35 prefixes ahead of 5 others.

Wireless and wireline

15 of Yellowknife’s 35 prefixes (42.9%) are held by carriers whose registered name marks a wireless business: Bell Mobility, TELUS Mobility and Ice Wireless Inc. Wireline prefixes still outnumber them, carried by Iristel Inc, Northwestel and SSi Micro Ltd. 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

Yellowknife’s dated assignments run from 2003 to 2025. The busiest period was 2020–2024, when 8 prefixes went to 3 carriers. 6 prefixes (17%) carry no date in the register: these are the historic pre-1999 assignments, the wireline bedrock of the rate centre. Since 2020 another 12 prefixes have been added, so the rate centre is still growing.

Yellowknife’s oldest prefixes, the ones the register leaves undated, belong to Northwestel and Bell Mobility: these carriers made up the landscape before competition arrived. The first dated assignment went to Northwestel in 2003. The most recent arrivals are Ice Wireless Inc. (2017), SSi Micro Ltd. (2017) and TELUS Mobility (2012), a sign that new carriers are still asking for numbers in Yellowknife.

Yellowknife’s 35 prefixes provide 350,000 numbers, which corresponds to a mid-sized city or a well-established suburb that every major carrier wants a slice of.

No single carrier dominates Yellowknife: the leader, Bell Mobility, holds only 34.3% of the prefixes against 5 competitors, a sign of a highly fragmented market where cable companies, mobility brands and VoIP providers weigh as much as the incumbent.

Demand remains steady: 41.4% of the dated prefixes go back to the last ten years, the most active period being 2020–2024. The rate centre is growing at a regular rather than explosive pace.

The register also shows 2 prefixes assigned but not yet in service in Yellowknife (Bell Mobility): numbers that will start showing up on call displays in the coming months.

6 undated in the register.

Dialling a Yellowknife number

A single area code, 867, covers Yellowknife, 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 +1 867 and the seven-digit number.

The numbering neighbourhood

Yellowknife shares area code 867 with at least 20 other rate centres, including Whitehorse, Iqaluit, Inuvik, Behchoko, Tuktoyaktuk, Arviat, Dawson City and Arctic Bay. The largest of them, Whitehorse, holds 30 prefixes in 867; the smallest on the list, Kimmirut, has just 3.

What a Yellowknife number tells you

A number attached to Yellowknife tells you that its prefix was issued to a carrier for this rate centre in Northwest Territories, most often Bell Mobility. It does not tell you where the handset is today: a subscriber may have ported the number to any of the 6 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 Northwest Territories area code is easy to borrow to look local.

Reading a register entry for Yellowknife: code 867-280 is recorded for Bell Mobility, so every 867-280-XXXX number (10,000 possible) descends from that assignment. “Yellowknife, Northwest Territories” there names a rate centre, not a municipality.

Every Yellowknife prefix

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

Allocated prefixes

All 35 in-service prefixes, grouped by rate centre.

Elsewhere in Northwest Territories