Contact not Showing in Contacts List (only in Recent Contacts)

I was having the exact same problem as everyone here. I have an Exchange account on my phone, which appears to have been the problem. When I switched the "Contacts" switch in my Exchange account (Settings->Mail, Contacts, Calendars-> Exchange Account -> Contacts) to "on", my "All Contacts" group in my address book reappeared. (Until then, my most universal option had been "All from My Mac," which didn't show contacts I added via Messages, manual phone # input, etc.) Even though I don't have any contacts on my Exchange account, it seems to have fixed the problem.

Within the "All Contacts" folder, all the #'s I have added now show up. The default contact group is now "All from My Mac," so I'm assuming everything will now work as normal. Hope this is helpful.

I Have the same exactly problem. Only contacts added by clicking + are listed in contact list. Using add from SMS ou Phone calls, the contact simply disappears; can be found just using global search in entire phone. I user Exchange Sync with Gmail contacts.

Hi,

I also have the same problem. I don't have an Exchange account, just a mobileMe account. I disabled and reactivated the sync between my contacts and mobileMe and all contacts appeared!
Now it works and I have no more problem!
🙂

I have an iPhone 3gs and MobileMe subscription. I've had all the bad stuff. A huge number of my contacts had the names deleted, so all I had were phone numbers. Many contacts I added where never added to either address book or my MobileMe account. I went into the options and tried to fix it following thier advice and it didn't work. Also got huge numbers of duplicates. A total nightmare basically.

Needless to say im not impressed.

I disabled the exchange sync with my google contacts, let it delete the google contacts from phone, then re-enabled it and said to keep the iphone contacts and it then worked ok with contacts added from recent call list appearing in my contacts - BUT now any contact I add on the phone doesn't appear in my google contacts although if I update a google contact it does update on my phone -- ARRGGH this is so annoying - I think would have preferred the previous problem!

I definitely have a love-hate relationship with my IPHONE - good as a little computer for accessing NET etc but not keen on it as a phone at all.

Now, I'M P I S S E D OFF!!
How could I not be able ADD a recent contact to my Address Book on my iPhone and look it up the normal way? What kind of phone is that?!?!
How could I not be able EDIT a recently added contact, add a photo to it?
Is that a FAIL for the Peach or what?
Yes, Peach, I don't give a ***** how good your software engineers are. I want my functionality back!

Hello everyone!
For all of you out there who have received phone calls, text messages, etc, and have tried adding a contact by means other than directly via the contacts app only to have your contact not show up ANYWHERE (except maybe in a spotlight search), this quick troubleshooting guide is for you.

Disclaimers: This can be performed on an Apple computer, I do not troubleshoot for PC's (however, anyone who knows their way around computers can easily modify the steps for a PC). This method can also be used if you sync your contacts via MobileMe like I do, and should work for the iPhone 3G, 3GS, and 4. I have the latest OS on my iPhone, but it should work with any recent OS. My iTunes has been updated to the most recent version.

Step 1: Open Address Book on your mac. Make sure your address book view is extended to show your groups in the left column. Under groups, everyone will have a group labeled "All Contacts". If that's the only group you have, it's time to create another one. Click the "+" at the bottom of your group column and name your new group whatever you want. For my purposes (as this was an iPhone issue), I named my new group "iPhone Contacts". Do not add any contacts from "All Contacts" to your new group, as this will be unnecessarily redundant. Close Address Book, you're done with it.

Step 2: Open iTunes and plug in your iPhone. Hopefully you have your settings to manually sync when you plug your iPhone into iTunes, otherwise wait until it's synced to continue. Click the "Info" tab in iTunes. The first option is Sync Address Book Contacts. Make sure this option is checked. Under the first subheading, make sure "All contacts" is checked. Below the groups box, there will be a line that says "Add contacts created outside of groups on this iPhone to:" and make sure this is checked as well. (Bonus info- Unless you created a contact directly via the contacts app on your iPhone, that contact ends up in another list. This is why you can't see it right now.) At this moment is where that new contact group you created in Address Book comes into play. Use the drop-down menu to the right of this option to select that group (remember mine was "iPhone Contacts"). Do not change anything else. Now click "Sync" in the bottom right corner of iTunes.

Step 3: Once your iPhone is synced, open the Contacts app on your iPhone. If it opens to a contact list, tap the "Groups" button in the upper left corner of the screen. You should see two or three sections. The top section will simply be "All Contacts". The second section will be titled "From My Mac" and will display both "All from My Mac" and the new group you created in Address Book. If you use MobileMe, you will have a third section titled "yourusername@me.com", under which your MobileMe contact group will fall. Make sure you tap the top group, "All Contacts". You will find those "missing" contacts now listed among all your other ones.

Bonus: If you find you have duplicate contact names but neither contact has a full information card, you can edit the contact, scroll to the bottom and tap the "Link contacts" button, then link your duplicates to insure you have all the info you want.

Success!! If you have any questions, let me know.

Source: Freelance Nerd Herd 🙂

Hello,

Thanks so much for this advice. But unfortunately, it didn't work for me!

Nothing showed up in my "iPhone Contacts" Group when I followed your instructions?! How can that be?!

Also, I don't see a "From my Mac" Group in my groups on my iPhone contacts.

Can you please offer any other suggestions?

I have the same problem, it drives me crazy.
One thing: do Apple geeks read these topics?
And if they do, why in the world they do not answer?

Hah! Can you imagine all the other bugs they're trying to fix!! LOL!!

I've got the same problem. I guess actual Apple support in the discussions is nonexistent. Wish I'd have stuck with the 3G due to this and other issues.

I havea problem syncing contacts between Outlook and my iPhone. It worked perfectly before installing the 4.0.1 iOS. Now I get a message that the server could not connect.