Locust vs Grasshopper: Two Very Different Answers

The phrase locust vs grasshopper shows up in search for two completely different reasons, and it is worth dealing with both honestly. The first is about insects: someone saw a big green jumper in the garden, or a swarm on the news, and wants to know what the difference actually is. The second is about business phones: Grasshopper is a well-known virtual phone system, and plenty of small business owners weighing it against other options type a comparison into the search bar and end up here.

The short insect answer: every locust is a grasshopper, but not every grasshopper is a locust. The short phone answer: Grasshopper and an AI receptionist like Ringhum solve different problems — one forwards calls to you, the other answers them for you. The rest of this article unpacks both, so whichever brought you here, you leave with what you needed.

The locust vs grasshopper difference, in one minute

Locusts and grasshoppers belong to the same family of insects, and biologically there is no hard line between them. The difference is behaviour. Most grasshoppers live solitary lives: they hop around fields and gardens, eat plants, and mind their own business. Certain grasshopper species, however, can switch into a swarming phase when conditions crowd them together — usually after rain follows a dry spell and food concentrates in small areas.

In that swarming phase, the insects change. They typically change colour, become more active, gather in enormous groups and migrate together, sometimes over very long distances. Those travelling swarms are what we call locusts, and they are the reason the word carries such a heavy reputation: a large swarm can strip crops across a wide area. The exact species and behaviours vary by region, so if you are dealing with a real infestation, local agricultural advice is the thing to trust.

The practical takeaway for a curious searcher: a single green or brown insect hopping in your garden is an ordinary grasshopper. A dense, moving cloud of insects on the news is a locust swarm — same family, very different behaviour. Now, on to the phones.

What Grasshopper the phone system actually does

Grasshopper is a virtual phone system aimed at small businesses. In plain terms, it gives you a business number that lives on top of your existing mobile phone, rather than requiring a separate handset or landline. Depending on the plan, features typically include things like call forwarding, extensions, voicemail and voicemail transcription. As of writing, plans and pricing change from time to time, so check their site for current details before deciding anything.

The businesses Grasshopper suits best are those where the owner wants a professional business number and is happy to answer calls personally. A freelancer who does not want to give out a private mobile number, or a two-person firm that wants calls routed between partners, can get real value from that setup. It is a tidy, established product for what it does.

What it does not do is answer the phone for you. When a call comes in and you are up a ladder, mid-haircut, with a customer or asleep, the call goes to voicemail. And voicemail is where a lot of small business revenue quietly goes to die, because many callers — especially anyone with an urgent problem — simply ring the next name on the list instead of leaving a message.

Locust vs grasshopper, business edition: forwarding vs answering

Once you see the distinction, the comparison becomes much clearer. A virtual phone system forwards calls to a person. An answering service answers them when the person cannot. Both are legitimate tools, but they fail in different places, so it is worth walking through a realistic day.

Take Tom, a self-employed electrician with one van and a good reputation. Here is a Tuesday with a forwarding-style setup:

• 7:20 am. A homeowner wakes up to a tripped fuse box and no hot water. Tom is driving to his first job. The call forwards to his mobile, rings out, goes to voicemail. The caller hangs up and rings the next electrician in the search results.
• 10:45 am. Tom is halfway through rewiring a kitchen, hands inside a wall, phone on silent for safety. Two calls come in. Two voicemails. One is a letting agent with a multi-property contract — they do not leave a message.
• 1:15 pm. Lunch break. Tom spends twenty minutes listening to voicemails, returning calls, and reaching two people who have already booked someone else.
• 8:50 pm. A landlord calls about a power cut in a rental flat. Tom is having dinner with his family and lets it ring. Voicemail again.

Nothing about that day is unusual, and nothing about it is Tom's fault. The phone system did exactly what it was designed to do: it forwarded the calls. But four genuine enquiries ended in voicemail, and at least two of those callers went elsewhere before Tom even knew they existed. Multiply a day like that across a month and the cheap phone system starts to look expensive.

What Ringhum does differently

Ringhum takes the other approach: it is an AI phone receptionist that answers your calls around the clock, so the call gets picked up even when you cannot pick it up. In Tom's Tuesday, the 7:20 am fuse-box call gets answered, the details taken, and an emergency visit booked into his calendar for first thing. The letting agent at 10:45 am gets a proper conversation and a callback scheduled for Tom's lunch break. The 8:50 pm landlord call is answered, assessed, and — because Tom marked power cuts as urgent — flagged straight to his mobile.

Beyond simply answering, Ringhum books appointments, takes orders and reservations, takes structured messages, and answers customers on WhatsApp, which matters more every year as callers increasingly prefer to message rather than ring. It works well for tradespeople like Tom, but also for restaurants, clinics, property managers and anyone else whose income arrives by phone while their hands are busy. There are no per-call surprises to decode; you can see the current plans on the Ringhum pricing page, and the full picture of how it works at Ringhum itself.

The honest caveat: an AI receptionist is not a magic fit for every business, and the next section says when it is not.

When Grasshopper or a human-staffed service genuinely wins

Fairness matters in a comparison, so here is where the other options are genuinely the better call.

Grasshopper wins when you reliably answer your own phone and simply want a professional number, call menus and voicemail transcription without paying for an answering layer you will never use. A consultant who works at a desk all day and picks up within three rings does not need anything more, and should not pay for anything more.

A human receptionist or live answering service wins when your calls are emotionally loaded or legally delicate. A family law practice taking distressed first calls, a medical setting where triage judgement matters, or a business whose callers regularly need ten minutes of patient, nuanced conversation — those calls deserve a person. Live services cost more per call, and for those situations the cost is justified.

Ringhum wins in the large middle ground: appointment-heavy businesses, trades, restaurants, salons, property management — anywhere the majority of calls follow recognisable patterns (booking, rescheduling, opening hours, prices, orders, urgent-vs-not) and the real enemy is the missed call rather than the difficult call.

How to choose: a five-step checklist

Whichever direction you are leaning, run through this before spending anything:

1. Log your calls for one full week. Note every call, the time, and whether you answered. Most owners are surprised by how many come in outside working hours or mid-job.
2. Count the missed ones honestly. Each missed first-time enquiry is a caller who likely rang a competitor next. That number, not the monthly subscription, is your real cost baseline.
3. Decide what you actually need: forwarding or answering. If your missed-call count is near zero, a virtual number system may be all you need. If it is not, no amount of clever forwarding fixes it.
4. Check the out-of-hours picture. Evenings, weekends and holidays are where forwarding setups fail hardest. Ask how any option handles a call at 9 pm on a Sunday.
5. Trial before committing. Any reputable service will let you test on real calls. Route your number for a fortnight, listen to how calls are handled, and judge with evidence rather than a feature list.

The bottom line on locust vs grasshopper

Two searches, two answers. The insect one: locusts are grasshoppers that have switched into swarming mode — same family, different behaviour, and the swarm is the part that matters. The phone one: Grasshopper is a solid virtual phone system for businesses that answer their own calls, while an answering service is for businesses whose problem is the calls they cannot reach. Work out which problem you actually have — the one-week call log above will tell you in seven days — and the choice mostly makes itself.

If your log shows missed calls, after-hours enquiries and voicemail as your silent receptionist, that is exactly the gap Ringhum was built to close: every call answered, bookings taken, orders and reservations handled, messages on WhatsApp, day and night. And if your log shows you already answer everything, we will say so plainly — keep your simple setup and spend the money elsewhere.

Frequently asked questions

Is a locust just a grasshopper?

Essentially, yes. Locusts are certain grasshopper species that can switch from solitary behaviour into a swarming phase when crowded. In that phase they typically change colour, gather in huge groups and migrate together. Every locust is a grasshopper, but most grasshoppers never swarm and stay solitary their whole lives.

Is Grasshopper an answering service?

No. Grasshopper is a virtual phone system: it provides a business number, extensions, call forwarding and voicemail features, but calls are forwarded to you or your team. If nobody picks up, the caller reaches voicemail. It routes calls rather than answering them, which is the key difference from any answering service.

Can an AI receptionist really book appointments on its own?

Yes, for structured tasks like bookings, rescheduling, orders, reservations and taking messages, a modern AI receptionist handles the whole conversation and writes the appointment straight into your calendar. For unusual, emotional or legally sensitive calls, it should flag the call and hand over to a person rather than improvise.

Do I need new hardware or a new phone number?

Generally, no. Virtual phone systems and AI receptionists typically work with your existing number through call forwarding, or provide a new business number that routes to your current phone. Setup is usually a matter of configuration rather than equipment, though exact details vary by provider, so confirm before signing up.

What happens to a call the AI cannot handle?

A well-set-up AI receptionist recognises when a call falls outside what it can resolve — a genuine emergency, an upset caller, a complex request — and escalates it: transferring to your mobile, alerting on-call staff, or taking a detailed priority message. You define which situations trigger a handover during setup.