Branded caller ID (CNAM) through your carrier

CNAM is the caller name that shows up alongside your number on the called party's phone. You do not send the name with your call — the receiving carrier looks it up from a database keyed on your number, so getting your name to display is about registering it, not configuring VICIdial.

What CNAM actually is

CNAM (caller ID name) stands for Caller Name. When you dial, VICIdial sends the number as caller ID, but it does not send a name. The called party's carrier takes your number and queries a LIDB — the Line Information Database — to find the name registered against it, then shows that name on the screen. So the display name is controlled by what is in LIDB, not by anything on your dialer.

This is why the same call can show a name on one network and just a city or state on another: each carrier may use a different LIDB source, and not all of them do the lookup at all.

How the lookup works

flowchart LR
  A[VICIdial dials with caller ID] --> B[Your carrier sends call]
  B --> C[Called party carrier]
  C --> D[LIDB lookup by number]
  D --> E[Registered CNAM name]
  E --> F[Name shown on phone]

The key point: the lookup is keyed on your DID (direct inward dialing), and it happens on the receiving side. You cannot push a name on a per-call basis from VICIdial — you register one name per number, and that name is what shows everywhere the lookup runs.

What you register, and where

To control your branded name you register the CNAM record for each number, usually through your Carrier or a dedicated CNAM provider. Typically this means:

1. Pick the display name. Most CNAM records are capped at 15 characters, so a long company name gets truncated — choose something that reads cleanly short.
2. Submit the name for each DID (direct inward dialing) you dial from, since CNAM is per-number, not per-account.
3. Wait for propagation. CNAM updates can take a few days to spread across the various LIDB sources.

A few practical notes for outbound dialing:

• Toll-free numbers handle CNAM differently from local DIDs, so a Toll-free number number may need a separate registration path.
• Branding alone will not save a number that already has a bad reputation — a flagged number can still show Spam Likely on top of your name.
• Test from more than one carrier's phone, because display varies by network.

Before you spend on CNAM, make sure the caller ID itself is reaching the carrier cleanly — if the number is being overwritten, no LIDB lookup will help. Our guide on the carrier account entry covers the trunk block where outbound identity is set, and the full setup is in the carrier integration guide.

A branded name lands better on a stable, known-good number. A VICIfast box gives you a fixed public IP and a branded subdomain in under 40 seconds so your carrier has one consistent origin to register against — see pricing to get started.