Get Started with Node.js Using Express

When you sign up with Plivo, we give you a free trial account and free credits to experiment with and learn about our services. You can add a number to your account to start testing the full range of our voice and SMS service features.

Follow these steps to get a free trial account:

Sign up with your work email address.
Check your inbox for an activation email message from Plivo. Click on the link in the message to activate your account.
Enter your mobile number to complete the phone verification step.

If you have any issues creating a Plivo account, please contact our support team for assistance.

To get started, try sending an SMS message either by using our API and XML documents, or via PHLO, our visual design tool, which allows you to create message flows using an intuitive canvas and deploy them with few clicks.

Using PHLO
Using API

Set up your Node.js and Express dev environment

You must set up and install Node.js, Express, and Plivo’s Node.js SDK before you send your first message.

You can check whether you have Node.js installed under macOS or Linux by running the command node --version in a terminal window. Under Windows, open a Windows command prompt or PowerShell and type node -v. If you don’t have Node.js installed or want a more current version, download and install it.

Install the Plivo Node.js package

Create a projects directory and change into it.

$ mkdir mynodeapp
$ cd mynodeapp

Install the Plivo Node.js SDK using npm.

$ npm install plivo

Once you’ve set up your development environment, you can start sending and receiving messages using PHLO, our visual workflow design studio, or using our APIs and XML documents. Here are three common use cases to get you started.

Send your first outbound SMS/MMS message

You can create and deploy a PHLO to send your first outbound SMS message with a few clicks on the PHLO canvas, and trigger it with some simple code.

Create the PHLO

To create a PHLO, visit the PHLO page of the Plivo console. If this is your first PHLO, the PHLO page will be empty.

Click Create New PHLO.
In the Choose your use case pop-up, click Build my own. The PHLO canvas will appear with the Start node.

Note: The Start node is the starting point of any PHLO. It lets you trigger a PHLO to start upon one of three actions: incoming SMS message, incoming, or API request.
From the list of components on the left-hand side, drag and drop the Send Message component onto the canvas. When a component is placed on the canvas it becomes a node.
Draw a line to connect the Start node’s API Request trigger state to the Send Message node.
In the Configuration pane at the right of the canvas, configure the Send Message node with a sender ID in the From field. Enter the destination number you wish to send a message to in the To field. Put your message in the Text field.

Note: You can define a static payload by specifying values when you create the PHLO, or define a dynamic payload by passing values through Liquid templating parameters when you trigger the PHLO from your application.
If you’d like to send an MMS message, configure the Media URLs field with the media files you’d like to send.
Once you’ve configured the node, click Validate to save the configuration.
After you complete the configuration, give the PHLO a name by clicking in the upper left, then click Save.

Your PHLO is now ready to test.

Trigger the PHLO

You integrate a PHLO into your application workflow by making an API request to trigger the PHLO with the required payload — the set of parameters you pass to the PHLO. You can define a static payload by specifying values when you create the PHLO, or define a dynamic payload by passing values through parameters when you trigger the PHLO from your application.

In either case, you need your Auth ID and Auth Token, which you can get from the overview page of the Plivo console.

AUTHID

You also need the PHLO ID, which you can copy from the PHLO list page.

PHLO List

With a static payload

When you configure values when creating the PHLO, they act as a static payload.

With Static Payload

Code

Create a file called TriggerPhlo.js and paste into it this code.

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var express = require('express')
var app = express()

app.post('/trigger_phlo/', function(req, res) {
    var plivo = require('plivo');
    var PhloClient = plivo.PhloClient;
    var authId = '<auth_id>';
    var authToken = '<auth_token>';
    var phloId = '<phlo_id>';
    var phloClient = phlo = null;

    phloClient = new PhloClient(authId, authToken);
    phloClient.phlo(phloId).run().then(function(result) {
        console.log('Phlo run result', result);
    }).catch(function(err) {
        console.error('Phlo run failed', err);
    })
})

app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 5000));
app.listen(app.get('port'), function() {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

Replace the auth placeholders with your authentication credentials from the Plivo console. Replace the phlo_id placeholder with your PHLO ID from the Plivo console.

With a dynamic payload

To use dynamic values for the parameters, use Liquid templating parameters when you create the PHLO …

With Dynamic Payload

… and pass the values from your code when you trigger it.

With Dynamic Payload

Code

Create a file called TriggerPhlo.js and paste into it this code.

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var express = require('express')
var app = express()

app.post('/trigger_phlo/', function(req, res) {
    var plivo = require('plivo');
    var PhloClient = plivo.PhloClient;
    var authId = '<auth_id>';
    var authToken = '<auth_token>';
    var phloId = '<phlo_id>';
    var phloClient = phlo = null;
    var payload = {
        From: '<sender_id>',
        To: '<destination_number>'
    }
    phloClient = new PhloClient(authId, authToken);
    phloClient.phlo(phloId).run(payload).then(function (result) {
        console.log('Phlo run result', result);
    }).catch(function (err) {
        console.error('Phlo run failed', err);
    });
})

app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 5000));
app.listen(app.get('port'), function() {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

Replace the auth placeholders with your authentication credentials from the Plivo console. Replace the phlo_id placeholder with your PHLO ID from the Plivo console. Replace the phone number placeholders with actual phone numbers in E.164 format (for example, +12025551234).

Test

Save the file and run it.

$ node TriggerPhlo.js

Note: If you’re using a Plivo Trial account, you can send messages only to phone numbers that have been verified with Plivo. You can verify (sandbox) a number by going to the console’s Phone Numbers > Sandbox Numbers page.

Receive your first inbound SMS/MMS message

You can create and deploy a PHLO to receive an inbound text message with a few clicks on the PHLO canvas, without writing a single line of code.

Prerequisite

To receive incoming text messages, you must have an SMS-enabled Plivo phone number. You can rent numbers from the Numbers page of the Plivo console, or by using the Numbers API.

Create the PHLO

To create a PHLO, visit the PHLO page of the Plivo console. If this is your first PHLO, the PHLO page will be empty.

Click Create New PHLO.
In the Choose your use case pop-up, click Build my own. The PHLO canvas will appear with the Start node.
Note: The Start node is the starting point of any PHLO. It lets you trigger a PHLO to start upon one of three actions: incoming SMS message, incoming call, or API request.
From the list of components on the left-hand side, drag and drop the HTTP Request component onto the canvas. When a component is placed on the canvas it becomes a node.
Draw a line to connect the Start node’s Incoming Message trigger state to the HTTP Request node.
In the Configuration pane at the right of the canvas, configure the HTTP Request node. Specify the address of your web server and specify that from, to, and text fields should be passed along with the request.
Once you’ve configured the node, click Validate to save the configuration.
After you complete the configuration, give the PHLO a name by clicking in the upper left, then click Save.

Assign the PHLO to a Plivo number

Once you’ve created and configured your PHLO, assign it to a Plivo number.

On the Numbers page of the console, under Your Numbers, click the phone number you want to use for the PHLO.
In the Number Configuration box, select PHLO from the Application Type drop-down.
From the PHLO Name drop-down, select the PHLO you want to use with the number, then click Update Number.

Assign PHLO to a Plivo Number

Test

You can now send a text message to your Plivo phone number and see how the inbound text is handled.

For more information about creating a PHLO application, see the PHLO Getting Started guide. For information on components and their variables, see the PHLO Components Library.

Forward an incoming SMS/MMS message

You can create and deploy a workflow to implement text message forwarding with a few clicks on the PHLO canvas.

Prerequisite

To receive incoming text messages, you must have an SMS-enabled Plivo phone number. You can rent numbers from the Numbers page of the Plivo console, or by using the Numbers API.

Create the PHLO

To create a PHLO, visit the PHLO page of the Plivo console. If this is your first PHLO, the PHLO page will be empty.

Click Create New PHLO.
In the Choose your use case pop-up, click Build my own. The PHLO canvas will appear with the Start node.
Note: The Start node is the starting point of any PHLO. It lets you trigger a PHLO to start upon one of three actions: incoming SMS message, incoming call, or API request.
From the list of components on the left-hand side, drag and drop the Send Message component onto the canvas. When a component is placed on the canvas it becomes a node.
Draw a line to connect the Start node’s Incoming Message trigger state to the Send Message node.
In the Configuration pane at the right of the canvas, configure the Send Message node with the phone number to which you want to forward the message.
Once you’ve configured the node, click Validate to save the configuration.
After you complete the configuration, give the PHLO a name by clicking in the upper left, then click Save.

Assign the PHLO to a Plivo number

Once you’ve created and configured your PHLO, assign it to a Plivo number.

On the Numbers page of the console, under Your Numbers, click the phone number you want to use for the PHLO.
In the Number Configuration box, select PHLO from the Application Type drop-down.
From the PHLO Name drop-down, select the PHLO you want to use with the phone number, then click Update Number.

Assign PHLO to a Plivo Number

Test

You can now send a text message to your Plivo phone number and see how the inbound text is forwarded.

For more information about creating a PHLO application, see the PHLO Getting Started guide. For information on components and their variables, see the PHLO Components Library.

More use cases

We illustrate more than a dozen use cases with code for both PHLO and API/XML on our documentation pages.

Install Node.js, Express, and the Plivo Node.js SDK

You must set up and install Node.js, Express, and Plivo’s Node SDK before you send your first SMS message.

Install Node.js

Install Express and the Plivo Node.js SDK

Create a projects directory and change into it.

$ mkdir mynodeapp
$ cd mynodeapp

Install Express and the Plivo Node.js SDK using npm.

  $ npm install express plivo

Once you’ve set up your development environment, you can start sending and receiving messages using our APIs and XML documents. Here are three common use cases to get you started.

Send your first outbound SMS/MMS message

You must have a Plivo phone number to send messages to the US or Canada; you can rent a Plivo number from Phone Numbers > Buy Numbers on the Plivo console or via the Numbers API.

Create an Express server

Create a file called SendSMS.js and paste into it this code.

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const express = require('express');
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');
const app = express();

app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({
    extended: true
}));
app.use(function(req, response, next) {
    response.contentType('application/xml');
    next();
});
app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 3000));
app.all('/outbound_sms/', function(request, response) {
    let client = new plivo.Client('<auth_id>', '<auth_token>');
    client.messages.create({
            src: '<sender_id>',
            dst: '<destination_number>',
            text: 'Hello, from Node Express!'
        }

    ).then(function(message_created) {
        console.log(message_created)
    });
});
app.listen(app.get('port'), function() {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

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const express = require('express');
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');
const app = express();

app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({
    extended: true
}));
app.use(function(req, response, next) {
    response.contentType('application/xml');
    next();
});
app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 3000));
app.all('/outbound_mms/', function(request, response) {
    let client = new plivo.Client('<auth_id>', '<auth_token>');
    response = client.messages.create({
        src: '<sender_id>',
        dst: '<destination_number>',
        text: 'Hello, MMS from Express!',
        type: 'mms',
        media_urls: ['https://media.giphy.com/media/26gscSULUcfKU7dHq/source.gif'],
        media_ids: ['801c2056-33ab-499c-80ef-58b574a462a2']
    }).then(function(response) {
        console.log(response)
    });
});
app.listen(app.get('port'), function() {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

Replace the auth placeholders with your authentication credentials from the Plivo console. Replace the phone number placeholders with actual phone numbers in E.164 format (for example, +12025551234). In countries other than the US and Canada you can use a sender ID for the message source.

Note: We recommend that you store your credentials in the auth_id and auth_token environment variables to avoid the possibility of accidentally committing them to source control. If you do this, you can initialize the client with no arguments and Plivo will automatically fetch the values from the environment variables. You can use process.env to store environment variables and fetch them when initializing the client.

Test

Save the file and run it.

$ node SendSMS.js

Receive your first inbound SMS/MMS message

To receive incoming messages, you must have a Plivo phone number that supports SMS; you can rent numbers from the Numbers page of the Plivo console or by using the Numbers API.

Create an Express server

Create a file called receive_sms.js and paste into it this code.

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const express = require('express');
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');
const app = express();

app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({
    extended: true
}));
app.use(function (req, response, next) {
    response.contentType('application/xml');
    next();
});
app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 3000));
app.all('/receive_sms/', function (request, response) {
    let from_number = request.body.From || request.query.From;
    let to_number = request.body.To || request.query.To;
    let text = request.body.Text || request.query.Text;
    console.log('Message received - From: ' + from_number + ', To: ' + to_number + ', Text: ' + text);
});
app.listen(app.get('port'), function () {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

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const express = require('express');
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');
const app = express();

app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({
    extended: true
}));
app.use(function (req, response, next) {
    response.contentType('application/xml');
    next();
});
app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 3000));
app.all('/receive_sms/', function (request, response) {
    let from_number = request.body.From || request.query.From;
    let to_number = request.body.To || request.query.To;
    let text = request.body.Text || request.query.Text;
    let media_url = request.body.Media0 || request.query.Media0;
    console.log('Message received - From: ' + from_number + ', To: ' + to_number + ', Text: ' + text+ ', Media: ' + media_url);
});
app.listen(app.get('port'), function () {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

Save the file and run it.

$ node receive_sms.js

You should see your basic server application in action at http://localhost:3000/receive_sms/.

Expose your local server to the internet

To receive incoming messages, your local server must connect with Plivo API services. For that, we recommend using ngrok, which exposes local servers running behind NATs and firewalls to the public internet over secure tunnels. Using ngrok, you can set webhooks that can talk to the Plivo server.

ngrok block diagram

Install ngrok and run it on the command line, specifying the port that hosts the application on which you want to receive messages (80 in this case):

$ ./ngrok http 80

This starts the ngrok server on your local server. Ngrok will display a forwarding link that you can use as a webhook to access your local server over the public network.

Sample ngrok CLI

Now people can send messages to your Plivo number.

Create a Plivo application to receive messages

Associate the controller you created with Plivo by creating a Plivo application. Visiting Messaging > Applications and click Add New Application. You can also use Plivo’s Application API.

Give your application a name — we called ours Receive SMS. Enter the server URL you want to use (for example https://<yourdomain>.com/receive_sms/) in the Message URL field and set the method to POST. Click Create Application to save your application.

Create Application

Assign a Plivo number to your application

Navigate to the Numbers page and select the phone number you want to use for this application.

From the Application Type drop-down, select XML Application.

From the Plivo Application drop-down, select Receive SMS (the name we gave the application).

Click Update Number to save.

Assign Phone Number to Receive SMS App

Test

Send a text message to the Plivo number you specified using any phone.

Reply to an incoming SMS/MMS message

To receive incoming messages, you must have a Plivo phone number that supports SMS; you can rent numbers from the Numbers page of the Plivo console or by using the Numbers API.

Create an Express server

Create a file called reply_to_sms.js and paste into it this code.

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const plivo = require('plivo');
const express = require('express');
const bodyParser = require('body-parser');
const app = express();

app.use(bodyParser.urlencoded({
    extended: true
}));
app.use(function(req, response, next) {
    response.contentType('application/xml');
    next();
});
app.set('port', (process.env.PORT || 3000));
app.all('/reply_sms/', function(request, response) {
    let from_number = request.body.From || request.query.From;
    let to_number = request.body.To || request.query.To;
    let text = request.body.Text || request.query.Text;
    console.log('Message received - From: ' + from_number + ', To: ' + to_number + ', Text: ' + text);

    //send the details to generate an XML
    let r = plivo.Response();
    let params = {
        'src': to_number,
        'dst': from_number,
    };
    let message_body = "This is an automatic response";
    r.addMessage(message_body, params);
    console.log(r.toXML());
    response.end(r.toXML());
});
app.listen(app.get('port'), function() {
    console.log('Node app is running on port', app.get('port'));
});

If you haven’t done so already, expose your local server to the internet.

Create a Plivo application to reply to messages

Associate the controller you created with Plivo by creating a Plivo application. Visiting Messaging > Applications and click Add New Application. You can also use Plivo’s Application API.

Give your application a name — we called ours Reply Incoming SMS. Enter the server URL you want to use (for example http://<yourdomain>.com/replysms/) in the Message URL field and set the method to POST. Click Create Application to save your application.

Create Application

Assign a Plivo number to your application

Navigate to the Numbers page and select the phone number you want to use for this application.

From the Application Type drop-down, select XML Application.

From the Plivo Application drop-down, select Reply Incoming SMS (the name we gave the application).

Click Update Number to save.

Test

Send a text message to the Plivo number you specified using any phone. You should receive a reply.

More use cases

We illustrate more than a dozen use cases with code for both API/XML and PHLO on our documentation pages.

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Get Started with Node.js Using Express

Sign up for a Plivo account

Sign up with your work email address

Set up your Node.js and Express dev environment

Install the Plivo Node.js package

Send your first outbound SMS/MMS message

Create the PHLO

Trigger the PHLO

With a static payload

Code

With a dynamic payload

Code

Test

Receive your first inbound SMS/MMS message

Prerequisite

Create the PHLO

Assign the PHLO to a Plivo number

Test

Forward an incoming SMS/MMS message

Prerequisite

Create the PHLO

Assign the PHLO to a Plivo number

Test

More use cases

Install Node.js, Express, and the Plivo Node.js SDK

Install Node.js

Install Express and the Plivo Node.js SDK

Send your first outbound SMS/MMS message

Create an Express server

Test

Receive your first inbound SMS/MMS message

Create an Express server

Expose your local server to the internet

Create a Plivo application to receive messages

Assign a Plivo number to your application

Test

Reply to an incoming SMS/MMS message

Create an Express server

Create a Plivo application to reply to messages

Assign a Plivo number to your application

Test

More use cases