13 Comments

  1. Simon
    28 March 2019 @ 10:29 pm

    Many thanks for this, it fixed an issue I had on an iMac using GMail for contacts.
    I disabled the Contact sync for GMail in internet accounts, deleted the AddressBook folder as mentioned in your post, re-enabled the Contacts in internet accounts, re-launched Contacts, and there they were !
    Now, I just need to figure out why I’m not seeing contact names in iMessage (same iMac) and just ‘phone numbers or email addresses.
    Many thanks again
    Simon

    Reply

    • Brendon Albiston
      8 June 2021 @ 8:02 pm

      I’ve had the same issue. Did you find a solution to getting Messages on the Mac to show Contact names and not just phone numbers?

      Reply

  2. Matt
    23 July 2020 @ 12:01 pm

    We have been incredibly surprised by the amount of views and responses we have had to this advice, and are pleased we were able to pass on the knowledge to other users who were experiencing issues with their Apple Contacts.
    Many thanks
    ableSEO Team.

    Reply

  3. Len West
    26 November 2020 @ 12:01 am

    All contacts were missing on MacBook Air. We just upgraded to Big Sur. Not sure if there’s a connection
    Fix:
    Logged out of iCloud. Waited, logged back into iCloud and after a few seconds they all popped back in
    The contacts had not disappeared from iPhone or iPad

    Reply

  4. Matt
    26 November 2020 @ 7:44 am

    Thanks for the update on this in relation to Big Sur upgrade Len.

    Reply

  5. Ellen Wargo
    16 December 2020 @ 8:27 pm

    Thank you. I would not have found this on my own.

    Reply

  6. Ken
    18 December 2020 @ 12:01 am

    I did this and now everything is gone 🙁

    Reply

    • Matt
      18 December 2020 @ 2:04 am

      We are sorry to hear that Ken. The advice on this topic is quite old now, but it seems to have worked for others in the past.

      Reply

  7. Nile
    7 January 2021 @ 5:44 pm

    Wow, it worked great. Thanks so much

    Reply

    • Matt
      8 January 2021 @ 7:59 am

      That’s great to hear Nile. Thanks for the comment.

      Reply

  8. John Mac
    24 September 2021 @ 6:50 pm

    Didn’t work. All I ended up with was a contacts list with my own name and Apple Canada. All I had done was click on “New Group” and poof all my contacts disappeared. Running Big Sur 11.6. Never had iClouds set up for contacts.

    Reply

  9. Rani
    25 September 2021 @ 4:03 pm

    THANK YOU!!!
    It is now 3 years later and my contacts disappeared suddenly from my High Sierra iMac- and this fix worked!
    Very grateful!

    Reply

    • Victoria
      28 January 2022 @ 10:56 pm

      I still cannot get my contacts back on my iMac with macOS High Sierra 10.13.6. Can you share what you did to get your contacts back in your iMac? Thank you

      Reply

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