Pausing a VoiceXML dialog of a multimodal application, including generating by the multimodal application a pause event; responsive to the pause event, temporarily pausing the dialogue by the VoiceXML interpreter; generating by the multimodal application a resume event; and responsive to the resume event, resuming the dialog. Embodiments are implemented with the multimodal application operating on a multimodal device supporting multiple modes of interaction including a voice mode and one or more non-voice modes, the multimodal application is operatively coupled to a VoiceXML interpreter, and the VoiceXML interpreter is interpreting the VoiceXML dialog to be paused.