When you click on the Contacts app on your iPhone, you want to see all your contacts. It can be very unpleasant when the contacts don’t show up or some of your contacts disappear. The reasons resulting in iPhone contact missing are different, so the solutions we will introduce are also different. We will also cover other related questions people are concerned about.
- All iPhone Contacts Disappear
- Some of My Contacts Are Missing from iPhone
- iPhone Contacts Disappeared (No iCloud Archive)
- iPhone Contacts Missing but Searchable
1. All iPhone Contacts Have Disappeared
Have you just clicked on your contacts app to find that all of them have disappeared? We understand that this can be very frustrating as it means that you cannot call or text any of your friends if you don’t know their number by heart.
Don’t worry. They haven’t all decided to ditch you! Let’s look at what you can do to get your contacts back.
Check Apple system status
Firstly, there is something you can do by checking the system status.
Sometimes, the systems at Apple can go down. It’s annoying, but it happens. When they’re down, there isn’t anything you can do besides waiting for the good people at Apple to sort the issue.
Click here to see the list of Apple’s services. Scroll down to where it says “iCloud Contacts”. Next to it, if it says “Unavailable”, just wait. And if it says “Available”, try some of our other tips.
Check that Contacts are turned on in iCloud settings
Make sure Contacts are enabled in your iCloud settings. If the contacts have not been saved to iCloud, your Apple device might not be able to display them on your phone. Here is how to turn on contacts in iCloud settings.
- On your iPhone, open the “Settings” App
- Select your name.
- Select “iCloud”.
- If the toggle button next to “Contacts” is grey, tap it to make it green.
- Your phone should now display a pop-up, which includes an option to “Merge”. Select this option.
Restore contacts from icloud.com
Another solution could be to restore your contacts from icloud.com. You will need to make sure that they have already been saved on your iCloud account for this to work.
To do this, open a desktop computer or laptop, and go to icloud.com. Then, enter your Apple ID and Password, and go to “Account Settings”.
In the lower-left of this page, you should see a link to “Restore Contacts”. Click this option, and choose an archive to restore. Click Done and the contacts should be restored to your phone.
Update iOS
If have tried the above methods, but your contacts are still nowhere to be seen, perhaps the issue is the version of iOS you have.
Having an outdated version of iOS can cause all sorts of issues. Thankfully, the problem is easy to fix.
- Open the “Settings” app on your phone.
- Select “General”.
- Select “Software Updates”.
- If there is a new version, you will see it and you can click the “Download and Install” button to get the latest iOS installed on your iPhone.
You can also select “Automatic Updates”. Make sure “Download iOS Updates” and “Install iOS Updates” are enabled. Then, whenever there is a new version of iOS, your phone will update automatically.
Restore ONLY contacts from iTunes backup
If you have previously used iTunes to backup your iPhone including contacts’ details onto your computer or laptop, you can recover your contacts by restoring the iTunes backup.
However, if you restore the whole iTunes backup to your iPhone, you will lose all the other data currently on your device because they will be replaced by the data in the backup. If you don’t like that case, you can use the software iMyFone iTransor to restore only the contacts from the iTunes backup to your iPhone.
- Download and install iMyFone iTransor on your computer.
- Connect your iPhone to your computer or laptop using a cable.
- Open the “iMyFone iTransor” software.
- Select “Restore Backup to Device” – located on the left column.
- iMyFone iTransor will then present you with a list of backup folders stored on your computer. Select the iTunes backup with all the contacts you wish to restore.
- Choose Restore Partial Backup.
- You will then be given a list of data types that you can restore to your device. Make sure “Contacts” is selected.
- You can click Preview & Restore if you are not sure the contacts in this backup are what you want. If you are sure, click “Directly Restore”.
After a short time, the contacts in your iTunes backup will be restored to your iPhone.
2. Some of My Contacts Are Missing from iPhone
Sometimes, the issue won’t be that all of your contacts are missing, but only some of them. This can be even more confusing, as there will probably be issues with how you’ve saved specific contacts and not your phone itself.
Let us offer you a few solutions to help you restore the contacts that have become lost.
Check if you’ve hidden some group contacts
It could be that some contacts have been put into a single group, and that group has been hidden. Because the group itself has been hidden, all your contacts within that group will also be hidden.
Here’s how to solve it.
- On your iPhone, open “Contacts”.
- At the top of the screen, you should notice a big black “Contacts” and a skinny blue “Groups”. Click on the skinny blue “Groups.”
- At the bottom of the screen will read either “Hide All Contacts” or “Show All Contacts”.
- If it says “Show All Contacts”, check if any of the groups there is not ticked. If there is any group not selected, tap on “Show All Contacts”. Then all of the groups will be ticked automatically. Click “Done”.
- If it says “Hide All Contacts”, check whether all the groups are ticked or not. If not, tap on “Hide All Contacts” and then it will show “Show All Contacts”. Just tap on “Show All Contacts” and then “Done”.
It will go back to the “Contacts” part of the “Contacts” App. You will see all the contacts there.
iPhone contacts disappeared after deleting email account
If you have deleted one of your email accounts from your iPhone, all contacts associated with that email account will be deleted too. You need to re-sync that email with your iPhone to get all of your contacts back.
- Simply go to Settings > Contacts > Accounts > Add Accounts.
- You will see the email providers (Yahoo, Gmail, Outlook, etc.).
- If there is no email provider that you’re using, click Other > Add Mail Account.
- Then, fill out the email address and password you use for that account.
Alternatively, you could go to Settings > Mail > Accounts > Add Accounts, select the email provider and enter your email and password. After verification is complete, click “Save”.
3. iPhone Contacts Disappeared (No iCloud Archive)
We introduced a method to recover the missing contacts by restoring contacts from icloud.com. What if there is no iCloud archive on icloud.com? That means your contacts are from your email account not iCloud. In this case, if your iPhone contacts disappeared, you must have deleted at least one email account from your iPhone. The solution to getting the missing contacts back to your iPhone is to re-add the email account to your phone. You can check the steps here.
4. iPhone Contacts Are Missing but Searchable
Another problem is that the contacts might not display in the “Contacts” app, but you can see them when you search for their name in the Messages app. This is usually a problem with iCloud not being connected to your contacts. Solve this issue by going to the Settings app, your name, iCloud, and making sure the toggle next to “Contacts” is green.
