At one time, if you wanted to talk on the phone, you needed a landline. Then cell phones came along, making it possible to leave home without missing a single call. However, that doesn’t mean home phones have gone away completely. In fact, 45.9 percent of U.S. households have a landline, with 6.5 percent shunning cellphones altogether in favor of being landline only.

There are many benefits to having a home phone. If you have small children in the house, you’ll likely gravitate toward a landline to give your youngest family members a way to talk to their friends until they’re old enough for phones of their own. You’ll also have the benefit of having your number easily traceable by emergency service dispatchers if you someday need to call 911. It’s also hard to ignore the generally far superior call quality you get with a landline versus a cellphone.

But landlines have come a long way since their heyday. Today’s cordless phones bring a variety of features, including the ability to link up your cell phones so that you can receive and make cell phone-based phone calls from your landline while you’re at home. Why would you want to do this? Because it gives you the call clarity and convenience of using your home’s cordless while also keeping you in touch with everyone you normally speak to through your cellphone.

As you’re shopping for a cordless phone, you’ll likely notice that some advertise that they include answering machines. Yes, you can sign up for voicemail through your phone company, but you may simply prefer to have it with your phone. If so, you may want to check with your landline service provider to make sure you can permanently disable your voicemail. Otherwise, you might find your voicemail is picking up, bypassing your answering machine every time.