If you have a standard cell phone and you port its number into Google Voice, the phone basically stops working.

Something like this would be beneficial if, for instance, you were going to move to a different state and you wanted to get a new, local number wherever you ended up. You could port your old number into Google Voice and whoever still called it would get forwarded to your new number.

Or maybe you have a personal cell phone but you get a new job where they give you a work cell phone and pay the bill for you, and you decide you don’t want to keep paying for your personal phone. You could port it to Google Voice so you don’t lose the phone number that all your friends and family use to get ahold of you.

The real benefit, in my opinion, will happen if and when this feature becomes available for landlines. The ability to port cell phone numbers is nice but, as you point out, it’s only beneficial in certain cases.

I am confused.