732 Area Code – Edison, New Jersey: Location, Time Zone & History

On a telephone keypad, area code 732 spells "SEA" -- a fitting coincidence for the code that covers the Jersey Shore. It was carved out of the southeastern portion of area code 908 on June 1, 1997, with 908 itself having split from the original statewide 201 back in 1991. Six months of permissive dialing followed before use of 732 became mandatory on December 6, 1997. The territory runs along the Middlesex, Monmouth, and northern Ocean county shoreline, plus slices of Somerset and Union counties.

Rapid growth strained the numbering pool quickly, and by 2001 an all-services overlay, area code 848, had been layered on top of the same footprint, bringing mandatory ten-digit dialing that December.

Beyond the beach towns, 732 anchors a mix of pharma, higher education, and shore tourism:

• Johnson & Johnson's world headquarters has stood in New Brunswick since 1983
• Rutgers University-New Brunswick, the university's largest campus, sits in the same city
• Asbury Park's Stone Pony, open since 1974, launched Bruce Springsteen's career -- he was born in Long Branch and raised in Freehold, both within 732
• The region is often cited as the defining area code of "Central Jersey" in the debate over whether that region exists