Active911 is a dispatch alerting and radio communications platform for first responders. More than 500,000 responders use Active911 at over 12,000 fire departments, EMS agencies, law enforcement agencies, search and rescue teams, 911 and dispatch centers, and emergency management offices across the United States, Canada, Latin America, Europe and Oceania.
Active911 sends more than 75 million alerts a year. Each alert goes to every responder paged, adding up to more than a billion notifications a year on responders’ phones.
Built for volunteer, combination and career departments, Active911 is a modern alternative to pagers. When dispatch tones out a call, every responder gets it on their phone in seconds: the call type, address, dispatch notes and a map to the scene. Responders tap to respond, and the chief, officers and dispatch can see who is coming and how far away they are.
The Active911 platform includes:
ActiveAlert: emergency alerting, paging and callout for first responders. ActiveAlert works with any CAD or dispatch system, with no change to how calls are dispatched. Features include instant alerts on iPhone, Android and Windows, responder status and personnel accountability, mapping with directions to the call, hydrants and other map data, units for apparatus, group messaging, a web console for administrators, and Webview, which shows live alerts and responders on station and dispatch screens. Departments on ActiveAlert share alerts with mutual aid partners at no extra cost. ActiveAlert is NERIS V1 compatible.
ActiveComms: radio over IP (RoIP) and push-to-talk (PTT) built into the same app. An ActiveBridge connects a donor radio to the internet, so responders can hear and talk on their land mobile radio (LMR) channels from their phone over cellular or Wi-Fi. Alert-triggered unmuting keeps a channel quiet until a call comes in, then opens it automatically, and administrators can give members listen-only access. ActiveComms works with the radios a department already has, keeping off-duty, volunteer and out-of-range personnel connected and supporting interoperability.
How Active911 is used:
Fire departments: paging volunteers and off-duty firefighters, tracking who is responding and getting crews to the scene faster.
EMS agencies: alerting on-call and rural ambulance crews with call details and directions.
Law enforcement: callouts for SWAT, K9, dive, crisis and investigative teams, and off-duty recall.
Dispatch and 911 centers: sending call details straight from CAD to responders’ phones and reducing radio traffic.
Search and rescue and emergency management: activating teams and volunteers quickly.
Pricing is published. ActiveAlert is $16.65 per device per year and ActiveComms is $60 per license per year plus $250 per ActiveBridge per year, both lower at volume. There are no setup fees or minimums.
ActiveAlert encrypts data, is SOC 2 audited every year with the report available on request, and is HIPAA compliant.
Active911 was founded in 2012 by Joseph Sullivan, a volunteer firefighter in Philomath, Oregon, after he missed a call on his pager in the mountains. It is based near Corvallis, Oregon. Departments choose Active911 because it is fast to set up, priced for departments of every size, and backed by an in-house support team: a person answers calls in about 30 seconds on average. Active911 is expanding the platform with new tools that bring more of a department’s daily work into the same place.
Departments can start a free 60-day trial of ActiveAlert or ActiveComms, with no obligation and no credit card required.
Who Is the Company Behind Active911?
