The +509 country code is for Haiti, the western third of the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean. The Dominican Republic occupies the other two-thirds. About 11.5 million people live in Haiti, making it the most densely populated country in the Americas outside of some Caribbean micro-states. Port-au-Prince, the capital, holds roughly 3 million people in its metro area, spread across hillsides with minimal urban planning. Haiti was the first Black republic in the world -- it gained independence from France in 1804 after the only successful large-scale slave revolt in history. That fact is a source of immense pride and also the beginning of Haiti's complicated relationship with the rest of the world: France demanded 150 million gold francs in "reparations" for lost slave property (later reduced to 90 million), a debt Haiti didn't finish paying until 1947. The country has been in an acute security crisis since 2023, with armed gangs controlling much of Port-au-Prince.

Quick answer: The country code +509 is for Haiti. All Haitian numbers are 8 digits after +509. Mobile numbers start with 3 (Digicel) or 4 (Natcom): +509 3X XX XXXX. Landlines start with 2: +509 2X XX XXXX. There is no trunk prefix -- dial the number exactly as written.

How to call Haiti: quick reference

Haiti has no trunk prefix. The number you dial domestically is the same number you dial internationally, just add +509 in front. France is listed because of the colonial and linguistic connection. The Dominican Republic shares the island. Brazil is included because a large Haitian diaspora formed there after 2010 (post-earthquake migration and Brazilian UN peacekeeping ties). The Bahamas has a large undocumented Haitian population.

Calling from Dialing format
US/Canada mobile +509 [local number]
US/Canada landline 011-509-[local number]
France 00-509-[local number]
Dominican Republic 00-509-[local number]
Brazil 00-509-[local number]
Bahamas 011-509-[local number]

Understanding Haiti phone numbers

Haitian phone numbers are 8 digits after the +509 country code. No exceptions, no variation. The first digit tells you the type of number:

Mobile numbers

Mobile numbers start with 3 or 4:

  • 3X XX XXXX: Digicel Haiti. The 3-prefix numbers are the most common in Haiti. Digicel dominates the market.
  • 4X XX XXXX: Natcom (formerly Teleco Mobile). Natcom numbers are newer and growing, especially in urban areas.

If someone gives you a Haitian number starting with 3, it's almost certainly a Digicel mobile. Starting with 4, it's Natcom.

Landline numbers

Landlines start with 2 and follow the format +509 2X XX XXXX. Most landlines are in Port-au-Prince and a few provincial cities:

City Prefix
Port-au-Prince 22, 28, 29
Cap-Haïtien 22
Les Cayes 22
Gonaïves 22

Landlines are rare in Haiti. The fixed-line network was never extensive and was further damaged by the 2010 earthquake. Even businesses that had landlines have mostly switched to mobile. If someone gives you a +509 number, assume it's mobile unless you know otherwise.

Mobile carriers in Haiti

Haiti has two mobile carriers. The market is effectively a duopoly.

Digicel Haiti (~60-70% market share)

The dominant carrier, owned by Irish billionaire Denis O'Brien's Digicel Group (now majority-owned by bondholders after a 2023 debt restructuring). Digicel entered Haiti in 2006 and quickly crushed the competition with aggressive pricing and marketing. The red Digicel branding is painted on walls, shops, and tap-taps (Haiti's colorful public transport buses) across the country. Digicel's MonCash is Haiti's largest mobile money platform -- and in a country where fewer than 20% of people have bank accounts, MonCash is how most financial transactions happen. Sending remittances from the US to a MonCash wallet is one of the most common ways Haitian-Americans support family back home.

Natcom (~30-40%)

Haiti's second carrier, a joint venture between the Haitian government and Vietnam's Viettel Group. Natcom launched in 2011, replacing the old state-owned Teleco. Viettel brought the same aggressive rural tower-building approach it used in Laos and other developing markets. Natcom has gained ground, especially since 2015, by offering competitive data plans. The 4-prefix numbers are Natcom. Coverage is decent in cities but weaker than Digicel in remote rural areas.

There used to be a third player, Haitel, but it collapsed years ago. If you encounter an old Haitian number that doesn't seem to work, it might be a defunct Haitel number.

Don't confuse +509 with nearby codes

The most common confusion is between Haiti (+509) and the Dominican Republic. But the Dominican Republic doesn't use +509 -- it uses +1 (the North American Numbering Plan) with area codes 809, 829, and 849. So the confusion isn't about similar country codes but about people not realizing that two countries sharing the same island have completely different phone systems.

Code Country Region
+509 Haiti Caribbean
+1 (809/829/849) Dominican Republic Caribbean (same island)
+508 Saint Pierre and Miquelon North Atlantic (French territory)
+507 Panama Central America

+508 is Saint Pierre and Miquelon, a tiny French territory off the coast of Newfoundland. Nobody is confusing it with Haiti in practice. +507 (Panama) is one digit off but geographically distant. The real issue is people dialing +1-809 thinking they're calling Haiti when they're actually reaching the Dominican Republic.

Time zone considerations

Haiti is on Eastern Standard Time (EST, UTC-5) and observes daylight saving time (EDT, UTC-4) from March to November, same as New York and Miami. This is a huge advantage for the US diaspora -- there's zero time difference for most Haitian-Americans calling home.

Your location Time difference Call Haiti 9 AM - 6 PM
US East Coast (EST/EDT) Same time zone 9 AM - 6 PM EST/EDT
US West Coast (PST) Haiti is 3 hours ahead 6 AM - 3 PM PST
US West Coast (PDT) Haiti is 3 hours ahead 6 AM - 3 PM PDT
France (CET) Haiti is 6 hours behind 3 PM - 12 AM CET
France (CEST) Haiti is 6 hours behind 3 PM - 12 AM CEST
Montreal (EST/EDT) Same time zone 9 AM - 6 PM EST/EDT
Dominican Republic (AST) Haiti is 0-1 hour behind 9 AM - 7 PM AST

Tip: The Dominican Republic does not observe DST (it stays on UTC-4 year-round), so during US summer months Haiti and the DR are on the same time, but during winter Haiti is 1 hour behind the DR despite sharing the same island. For the French diaspora, afternoon and evening calls from Paris land during Haitian business hours.

Communication in Haiti

Language

Haiti has two official languages: Haitian Creole (Kreyòl) and French. Virtually everyone speaks Kreyòl -- it's the language of daily life, of the markets, of tap-tap conductors shouting routes. French is the language of government, the courts, and the educated elite, but only about 5-10% of the population speaks it fluently. If you're calling someone in Haiti and you don't speak Kreyòl, French is the fallback for business and official contexts. English has limited presence outside of the NGO sector and some Port-au-Prince businesses that serve the diaspora.

Messaging apps

WhatsApp is the dominant communication app. Voice notes are especially popular -- many Haitians prefer sending a voice message in Kreyòl over typing. WhatsApp calls are the standard way to avoid international calling charges. Facebook Messenger is also widely used; Facebook itself is the primary social media platform. Telegram and Signal have niche followings among journalists and NGO workers.

For the diaspora, WhatsApp group chats connecting family members in Miami, Montreal, and Port-au-Prince are practically universal. These groups are where news gets shared, money requests are made, and family decisions happen.

Network quality

4G is available in Port-au-Prince, Cap-Haïtien, and along major highways. Digicel has better coverage than Natcom in rural areas, but neither is reliable in the mountainous interior. Power is the main constraint -- Haiti's electrical grid covers less than 40% of the population, and even in Port-au-Prince blackouts are daily occurrences. Cell towers run on generators, and when diesel runs out, the tower goes dark. During the current security crisis, fuel shortages have worsened tower uptime. If a call to Haiti fails, power and fuel problems are often the reason, not a wrong number.

The Haiti diaspora

Haiti's diaspora is massive relative to its population. Roughly 1.5-2 million Haitians live abroad, and their remittances account for about a third of Haiti's GDP. The diaspora is the country's largest source of foreign income -- bigger than exports, bigger than aid.

Where they went

  • United States: The largest community, over 1 million people including US-born children of Haitian immigrants. South Florida is the epicenter -- Little Haiti in Miami, plus large communities in Broward County (Fort Lauderdale, Pompano Beach) and Palm Beach County. New York City (Brooklyn's Flatbush, Queens) is the second hub. Boston, New Jersey (Newark, East Orange), and Connecticut also have established communities. Migration came in waves: the Duvalier-era political refugees (1960s-80s), the "boat people" of the 1990s, post-earthquake arrivals after 2010, and TPS (Temporary Protected Status) holders.
  • Canada: About 165,000 Haitians, almost entirely in Montreal. The Quebec connection is linguistic -- Montreal is French-speaking, which made it a natural destination for educated Haitians fleeing the Duvalier dictatorship in the 1960s and 70s. The Haitian community in Montreal is one of the oldest and most established immigrant communities in Canada. Michaëlle Jean, Haiti-born, served as Governor General of Canada.
  • Dominican Republic: This is the most fraught diaspora relationship in the Caribbean. An estimated 500,000-800,000 Haitians and people of Haitian descent live in the DR, many undocumented. They work in construction, agriculture (especially sugarcane), and domestic service. The DR's 2013 Constitutional Court ruling (TC-168-13) retroactively stripped citizenship from Dominican-born people of Haitian descent going back to 1929, affecting an estimated 200,000 people. Cross-border tensions are constant.
  • France: 80,000-100,000 Haitians, mostly in the Paris suburbs (Seine-Saint-Denis, Val-de-Marne). The colonial connection is complicated: France extracted wealth from Saint-Domingue (colonial Haiti) through slave labor, making it the richest colony in the Western Hemisphere, then demanded payment after Haiti won independence.
  • Brazil: 30,000-50,000 Haitians arrived after the 2010 earthquake, partly because Brazil led the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH, 2004-2017) and was seen as welcoming. Many settled in São Paulo and southern Brazil. Some later moved north to the US-Mexico border seeking entry to the US.
  • Chile: About 30,000-40,000 Haitians arrived between 2015 and 2018, drawn by Chile's open visa policy at the time. Santiago has a visible Haitian community. Chile later tightened immigration rules.
  • Bahamas: 40,000-80,000 Haitians, many undocumented, in a country of only 400,000 people. This creates tension. The crossing from northwest Haiti to the Bahamas is short but dangerous.

Why they call

Remittances drive phone traffic. A Haitian-American in Miami sends money via MonCash or Western Union, then calls to confirm it arrived. This is a weekly ritual for hundreds of thousands of families. Calls also spike around Haitian holidays: Independence Day (January 1 -- Haiti was the first country to declare independence on New Year's Day, in 1804), Carnival (February/March), Jour des Morts (November 2), and Christmas. After natural disasters or security crises, calling volume surges as diaspora members check on family. The 2010 earthquake, the 2021 earthquake, and the 2023-2024 gang crisis all triggered massive calling spikes.

Dialing examples

Haiti has no trunk prefix. The 8-digit number is the same domestically and internationally -- just add +509.

Example 1: Calling a Port-au-Prince mobile (Digicel) from Miami

  • Haitian number: 3712 3456
  • From a US mobile: +509 3712 3456
  • From a US landline: 011 509 3712 3456

The "3" tells you it's a Digicel mobile. No leading 0 to drop.

Example 2: Calling a Natcom mobile from Montreal

  • Haitian number: 4890 1234
  • From Canada: +509 4890 1234 or 011 509 4890 1234

The "4" tells you it's Natcom. Canada uses the same dialing format as the US.

Example 3: Calling a Port-au-Prince landline from France

  • Haitian number: 2940 5678
  • From France: 00 509 2940 5678

The "2" tells you it's a landline. These are increasingly rare.

Example 4: Calling a Haitian mobile from the Dominican Republic

  • Haitian number: 3698 7654
  • From DR: 00 509 3698 7654

Common mistakes to avoid

Here are the most common mistakes when dialing the +509 country code:

Adding a trunk prefix that doesn't exist

Haiti has no trunk prefix. Don't add a 0 before the number. If the number is 3712 3456, dial +509 3712 3456. Not +509 0 3712 3456. Many people assume every country has a trunk prefix because most do. Haiti doesn't.

Confusing Haiti with the Dominican Republic

They share an island but have completely different phone systems. Haiti is +509. The Dominican Republic is +1 (with area codes 809, 829, 849). If you dial +1-809 followed by a number, you're calling the DR, not Haiti. If you dial +509, you're calling Haiti. The island split matters.

Calling during power outages or fuel shortages

Haiti's power grid is unreliable. Cell towers run on diesel generators, and when fuel deliveries are disrupted (which happens regularly during security crises), towers go offline. If you can't reach someone, try again in a few hours. The problem is often infrastructure, not the number.

Not accounting for the security situation

Since 2023, armed gangs have controlled significant portions of Port-au-Prince and blocked major roads. Telecom infrastructure in gang-controlled areas may be damaged or non-functional. Cell towers have been looted for their generators and copper. If someone in Port-au-Prince suddenly becomes unreachable, the security situation may be the cause.

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Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

What country has the +509 country code?

The +509 country code is for Haiti, a Caribbean nation on the western third of the island of Hispaniola. Capital: Port-au-Prince.

How many digits is a Haitian phone number?

All Haitian phone numbers are 8 digits after +509. Mobile numbers start with 3 (Digicel) or 4 (Natcom). Landlines start with 2.

How do I call Haiti from the USA?

From a mobile phone, dial +509 followed by the 8-digit number. From a landline, dial the US exit code 011, then 509, then the 8-digit number. No leading 0 to drop.

Does Haiti share a country code with the Dominican Republic?

No. Haiti uses +509. The Dominican Republic uses +1 with area codes 809, 829, and 849. They share the island of Hispaniola but have completely separate phone systems.

Does Haiti have a trunk prefix?

No. Haiti does not use a trunk prefix. Dial the 8-digit number directly after +509.

What time zone is Haiti in?

Haiti is on Eastern Time (EST/EDT, UTC-5/UTC-4), the same as New York and Miami. Haiti observes daylight saving time.

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