989 Area Code – Saginaw, Michigan: Location, Time Zone & History

Area code 989 covers Michigan's Saginaw Valley and the central and northeastern Lower Peninsula, split off from 517 -- one of Michigan's three original 1947 area codes, alongside 313 and 616 -- when it entered service on April 7, 2001. The split left 517 with the south-central Lansing/Jackson region while 989 took the Saginaw/Bay City/Midland Tri-Cities area and territory reaching north toward Alpena and Gaylord. Two decades later, mandatory ten-digit local dialing took effect in 2021 to accommodate the new nationwide 988 code.

Saginaw, Bay City, and Midland together form the officially branded Great Lakes Bay Region, an eight-county area entirely within 989's numbering plan. Midland has hosted Dow Chemical Company's headquarters since 1897, while Saginaw's history includes GM steering gear and transmission manufacturing. Central Michigan University sits in Mount Pleasant, and the Saginaw Valley's farmland supports dry bean and sugar beet production alongside tourism along the northern Lower Peninsula's lakes and Lake Huron shoreline.

Near Mount Pleasant, the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe operates Soaring Eagle Casino & Resort on the Isabella Indian Reservation, established by an 1855 treaty. 989 also holds a numbering-plan distinction: it is the highest-numbered area code in active use, since the format forbids a middle digit of 9 in any other combination.