I lost all my contacts in my mobile phone? How can I get this back?

Hi guys,

Our contacts are the most important part of our life. If we lose our contact we lose contact with half of our world. Whenever we lose our phone or when it is not working or when we change our phone. The first thought that comes to our mind is about our contacts.

Today, we will discuss how can we be save all our contacts data whenever we change our phone or if our phone is stolen or if it's stopped working.

We will discuss two types of phones:

1. Smartphones

1. Non Smartphones

Smartphones: 

All phones which have multiple features and can be also used for multiple purposes like chatting, watching videos, browsing, etc.

Non Smartphones: 

All phones have basic features like calling and SMS.

Smartphones: 

When we set up a phone, we usually set up our Gmail account for the Android phone. You should always save all your contacts in your Gmail account and not your phone or sim card. I will tell you the reason for that as well.

 If you save your contacts in your phone directory, there are chances that when your phone is stolen or whenever there is a software issue on your phone. Your contacts might get lost or deleted. You will not be able to recover these contacts. Also, note that you can only save your contacts to a certain limit until your phone memory is not full.

Usually, the sim card can store anywhere between 250 to 500 contacts. Usually, a  32KB sim card can hold up to 250 contacts and 64KB sim card can hold up to contacts. There is always a risk if your sim card is blocked. You will lose all your contacts.

Saving in your smartphones company account may again lead to data loss.

The ultimate solution:

Smartphone: There is a special feature on all your smartphones. You can save all your contacts in your Gmail account free of cost and there is no limit on the number of contacts that you can save. I will show you step by step how you can save all the contacts in your  Gmail account.

• Step1: Go to settings of your Android phone
• Select accounts
• Click on your email id (Example: xyz@gmail.com)  
• Select contacts and make sure the checkbox is ticked
• Click on the back button and you will see the auto-sync button. Make sure it is turned on 

Auto Sync:

The auto-sync can see set to sync from one day to 30 days. I would suggest you keep this as 1 day as the day you save a contact in your google account. The same day it will get saved in your google account.
To change Auto Sync, go to your Gmail app>>Clik on the icon 'four horizontal lines' on the left-hand top corner>> click on settings>>click on your Gmail account you want to sync>>>Under 'Data Usage' section you will see an option "Days of mail to Sync".This will sync your contacts every day. 

Benefits of saving in Google is that whether your phone is stolen or your software crashes. You will have all your contact safe in Google contacts.

Benefits of saving in Google Contacts:

• You can save multiple mobile/ landline numbers under one name
• You can save the photo of the person in Google contacts
• You can save multiple email ids of a person
• You can write a business name or company name of an individual
• You can also write a note, birthday, address, website name, social media account, Nickname and also set a ringtone for a particular person 

Drawbacks of saving in Google contacts:

• If you are changing your phone from a smartphone to a non-smartphone, you cannot save your data in Google contacts
• Neither can you sync your contacts daily

How to add and save a new contact number in google contacts?

Whenever you save a new contact on your smartphone. At the bottom of the page, you will see the option "Save location". When you click on this it will show you options like phone, Sim 1/Sim 2 and "Your Gmail account name". Please set this as your Gmail account name by default. 

Why is this important? because whenever you save a contact number as save it in your Gmail account. Gmail automatically saves the number in your Gmail account and you will never ever lose that number.

How to Export/ Import mobile numbers from a mobile phone:

Export contacts from your device and save it: 

We export contacts when we want to transfer our contacts from the current phone to some other phone or want to save it somewhere like our desktop. This is when we export contacts.

1. Click on System app settings
2. Click on Contacts
3. Click on the 1st option that you see is 'Import/Export contacts'

1. Click on the export contacts button. You will see an option to select the contacts you want to export.
2. Usually, people want all the contacts to be exported. In this case, click on 'Select all' if you want to transfer all your contacts and then click 'Export' at the bottom of the page.
3. A pop-up will appear with details where your file will be store. Click 'Ok' on this page.
4. All your contact will be saved in a '.vcf'' file format on your mobile device. You can find this file in your file manager app by following the below-mentioned steps:

Click on file manager>>click on documents>> the contacts will be saved by today's date-time name. (example: If you export on 1st July 2020 at 1:15:10 pm. The filename would be '2020-07-01 13-15-10.vcf)

Import contacts into your device and sync it with Gmail contacts

We import when we are shifting from a non-smartphone to a smartphone. In this case, the contacts need to be imported. Please follow the below steps to know more:

1. Repeat step 1 to 3 from 'Export contacts from your device' section
2. If you want to save your contacts from some other device then you have to export it from another device in a '.vcf' file format and save it in your device via Bluetooth or any sharing app.
3. When you click on this it will open the .vcf file from file manager and you can select and import contacts from '.vcf' file you extracted from another device and then sync it with your Gmail account This way you can save all your contacts in your smartphone.

There is one more important tab available on the Contacts page:

1. In the Contacts section, you can see the option of 'Copy'. When you click on this option, you have the option of copying all your contacts saved in 'Phone', 'Sim 1' or 'Sim 2' to be copied to your Gmail account.

How to copy contacts from a non-smartphone to your Gmail account?

From a non-smartphone, you will need to copy all the contacts via Bluetooth to a smartphone and convert it into '.vcf file'. Then import it to your Gmail contacts account.

These are some simple methods to save your contacts forever. I have also written on how you can create a Gmail account and its benefits. You can check it in the below link.

How to set up Gmail account for free with and without your mobile number and benefits of using Gmail account?

Please do leave a comment if you have any suggestions.