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iCloud.com Contacts partially syncing to iOS devices, Macbook sync does work

Recently I migrated my contacts from Google to iCloud and found that while all show up in iCloud.com and the Contacts app on my Macbook several are missing from the Contacts app on my iPhone.


  • Tried several times on different days with the same outcome.
  • Rebooted my iPhone.
  • Disabled/re-enabled Contact sync for iCloud.
  • Made sure there are no Contact syncs from other accounts.
  • Cleared network settings (in case there was some hiccup related to network cache).
  • Tried the import from both iCloud.com and from the Mac app.


All have the same outcome: Mac and iCloud.com are perfectly in sync but on my iPhone (and also iPad) some contacts are structurally not syncing (but interestingly they do appear in Mac Contacts as well as in iCloud.com).


Recently I found that if I go into the Contact entry that is not syncing and change the name, it does show up. I am not using any special characters and can't figure out a reason why it does this.


My contact list is rather big so going over them one by one is not really and option. Also I would really like to understand why it isn't syncing.


Any thoughts and/or help is greatly appreciated.

iPhone 11 Pro, 14

Posted on Nov 30, 2020 10:56 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Dec 2, 2020 4:21 AM

Root cause seems to be related to the file format or export file that is being generated via export contacts function in contacts.google.com.


Work around fix (only works on Mac):


  • Sync Google contacts to Mac.
  • Go to Contacts app on Mac and select all Google contacts.
  • Export to vCard. 
  • Optional (but better for clarity): disable Google contacts sync with Mac.
  • Import vCard into iCloud account in Contacts app on Mac.
  • Sync with iOS (iPhone/iPad) works again. 
  • Also fixes issue where e.g. a contact birthday went missing during the export.
  • Works on Mac only. 
  • Cannot be done on iOS as it doesn't give you the option to keep Google contacts locally after disabling Google sync.


Similar questions

3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Dec 2, 2020 4:21 AM in response to Maho_88

Root cause seems to be related to the file format or export file that is being generated via export contacts function in contacts.google.com.


Work around fix (only works on Mac):


  • Sync Google contacts to Mac.
  • Go to Contacts app on Mac and select all Google contacts.
  • Export to vCard. 
  • Optional (but better for clarity): disable Google contacts sync with Mac.
  • Import vCard into iCloud account in Contacts app on Mac.
  • Sync with iOS (iPhone/iPad) works again. 
  • Also fixes issue where e.g. a contact birthday went missing during the export.
  • Works on Mac only. 
  • Cannot be done on iOS as it doesn't give you the option to keep Google contacts locally after disabling Google sync.


iCloud.com Contacts partially syncing to iOS devices, Macbook sync does work

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