callee
The person who is called by the caller (on the telephone).
callee: the person receiving a telephone call
In telephone systems, the callee is the party being called, the endpoint waiting to receive an incoming connection. When a caller dials a number, that number's subscriber becomes the callee. The callee's telephone rings, signals arrival of the call, and the callee accepts or rejects the connection.
From a switching and signaling perspective, the callee's identity is established by the dialed number and routing tables in the exchange. The callee's line must be idle or the exchange must handle call-waiting, conference bridging, or similar features to manage the incoming signal. The callee's handset or telephone instrument receives the ringing signal, which is typically an AC voltage between 40 and 150 volts at 16 to 25 Hz in older systems, or a digital alert in modern VoIP networks.
Callee vs. caller in circuit switching
The distinction between callee and caller matters in billing, routing, and responsibility. In circuit-switched networks, the callee's line must be monitored for availability and signaling state. The callee may occupy a trunk line, private branch exchange (PBX) extension, or dedicated subscriber line. If the callee's line is busy, the exchange returns a busy signal to the caller; if the callee does not answer within a timeout period, the call may route to voicemail or drop.
In packet-switched and VoIP systems, the term callee remains in use but with less mechanical significance. The callee's address is resolved through session initiation protocol (SIP) or similar mechanisms, and the connection is bidirectional once established. The callee may appear offline, busy, or available depending on the state advertised by their client application rather than their handset's physical hook state.
Telecom engineers use callee terminology when designing call completion logic, billing systems, call routing algorithms, and feature sets such as call forwarding, screening, and recording. The callee's experience, whether the phone rings once, multiple times, or not at all, depends on exchange programming and the features active on that subscriber line.