Truecaller wants to turn your phone calls into a checkout. The caller-ID app has launched Call-to-Cart, an AI-powered advertising tool that lets brands move a user from seeing an ad to completing a purchase in two steps, built around the moments when a call comes in or ends.
Truecaller Ads announced the global launch on 17 June 2026 from Nairobi, Kenya. The product rolls out across Truecaller’s user base of more than 500 million people in over 150 countries, a base in which Africa is one of its largest regions.
How it works
Call-to-Cart targets two high-attention moments: when a user receives a call and just after it ends, using AI to surface a relevant offer and a short path to buy. Truecaller says it is aimed at its biggest advertiser categories: fast-moving consumer goods, direct-to-consumer beauty, pharmaceuticals, fintech and mobility.
Behind it is adVantage, an in-house Truecaller platform that combines a recommendation engine, AI personalisation and the company’s first-party data to decide which offer to show, and when.
A whitelisted first phase
For now, access is limited. Truecaller has whitelisted a select group of “always-on” direct advertisers in key markets for the first phase, with dedicated onboarding and custom integrations, rather than opening it to all advertisers.
“Millions of purchase decisions begin outside shopping environments,” said Hemant Arora, vice-president and global head of Truecaller Ads, framing communication moments as a new commerce surface.
The launch extends Truecaller’s move beyond spam-blocking into business and advertising tools, after it opened its Business Chat platform, and adds to a busy stretch for African ad-tech. Whether users welcome shopping prompts wrapped around their calls, on an app many install precisely to cut unwanted ones, will be the real test.
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