In 2009, the Canadian Numbering Administrator forecast that area code 204 would be exhausted within a few years even though there were only 1.2 million people in the entire province. An area code provides about 7.8 million telephone numbers, but Canada uses an allocation scheme that allots all ten thousand numbers of a central office prefix to competitive local exchange carriers even for the smallest hamlets. Canada does not implement number pooling. Therefore, once a number is allocated to a rate centre, it cannot be reassigned elsewhere even if a rate centre has more than enough numbers to service it. The number exhaustion was caused by the proliferation of cell phones, particularly in and around Winnipeg.
In July 2010, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission approved a province-wide overlay with area code 431 for implementation in November 2012.[1] On July 30, 2012, 10-digit dialing became mandatory throughout the province.[2] Although that had the effect of allocating about 15.6 million numbers to a province of just over 1.2 million people, MTS and other carriers in the province preferred that method to a geographical split, which would have seen one part of the province retain area code 204 and another part receive the new area code 431. The province's telephone companies wanted to spare Manitobans the expense and burden of changing telephone numbers.
Area code 584 was reserved as a third area code for the region in February 2017.[3] It was implemented on October 29, 2022.[4][5]
The incumbent local exchange carrier for the area codes is Bell MTS.
Calls to the following communities can be direct-dialed from Winnipeg as a local call: Dugald, Lockport, Lorette, Oakbank, St. Adolphe, St. Francois Xavier, Sanford, Starbuck, Stonewall, and Stony Mountain.
