I have noticed many contact cards in my Contacts that I didn't add. They are people I sent emails to using Apple Mail on my Mac. How do I stop this from happening? Running the new iOS17 on a new iPhone 15 plus.
iPhone 15 Plus, iOS 17
I had this happen and found out how to fix it, for me at least.
On your Apple device where they appear, go to Settings > Contacts > Accounts > Choose the account that is causing this issue. In my case, it was Gmail. Choose Gmail, then disable Contacts. It will show:
Turn off Contacts
Are you sure you want to continue? All Gmail contacts will be removed from your phone.
Delete from My iPhone
Cancel.
I chose Delete from My iPhone and it removed all of the new ones that were added.
I'm sorry to hear you're having this problem, too. I am glad, however, that it's not just my imagination. Early responders seemed to think it was some simple thing maybe I was doing or misunderstanding. But no, I have contacts I didn't add (but did send email to, some through gmail) or text one time. I deleted mine manually as well, hope someone figures this out soon so we don't have to keep doing this!
Unfortunately, no. I tried the suggestion jongrahl made about turning it off in gmail but that deleted other contacts I had added manually as well. Not sure why that happened, but I had to turn it back on and then the contacts I actually wanted came back in. I've tried all other suggestions and nothing is working. That said, I haven't had other contacts added mysteriously since I deleted the first batch a couple of weeks ago.
Hi all,
I said I'd report back after trying jongrahl's suggestion, and unfortuately it didn't work for me. Doing so deleted other contacts I had added manually as well. Not sure why that happened, but I had to turn it back on and then the contacts I actually added myself were reinstalled. I've tried all other suggestions made and nothing is working. That said, I haven't had other contacts added mysteriously since I deleted the first batch a couple of weeks ago. Maybe it was a glitch of the new iOS or another change Google made? Fixed behind the scenes? Has anyone had it happen more than once?
Ok. I fixed it, here’s how. Follow jongrahl direction then go back and turn the contacts back on. It will put back the contacts you had before the mother load dump. It added 3500 contacts to my list. Now it’s back to 300-ish.
Do you know if this will affect the ability of Apple Mail to auto populate email addresses from prior correspondences?
For instance, if I start a new email and begin typing a name in the To: field, "Dan..."
A drop-down list of names that begin with Dan appears (and the associated email):
Dan A - dana@gmail
Danny Z - dannyz@gmail
None of these individuals are saved into my i/macOS Contacts app, so I assume this feature works based off of prior correspondences to these individuals. This is a convenient feature that I do not want to lose.
However, I too am having the problem you described: emails recently began to be added to my i/macOS Contacts, sometime even appearing as DanA@gmail, etc. I also found instances of duplicated contacts. I changed no settings myself, so I suspect that it must be related to an i/macOS update and/or a gmail setting.
Seems like a highly undesirable effect, so not sure why Apple/Google would impose it as the default setting (instead of an opt-in approach).
It worked sort-of.
when taking out the gmail contacts, a lot of my local contacts are deleted as well.
Anyone got this as well?
I only save my contacts locally on my phone, they’re not linked to gmail …
This worked for me, thanks!
I was on the phone with Apple Support earlier to ask about this but he couldn’t figure it out and told me I’d have to contact Google cuz it’s on their end.
When we were doing screen share, he even had me go into Google settings to do something so not sure how he didn’t know but oh well.
No. That is not what is happening. THey are actually new entries in the contacts list. It's annoying AF because anyone I emailed with now is in my contacts, and it's too numerous to manually delete.
It's not about Siri Suggestions. That's if you ask Siri or do a search. These are literally IN your contacts list added automatically without your choice to opt in simply because you had emails with this person.
I know it has something to do with Gmail cuz like what you said, they’re getting added into my “email” under LISTS. I accidentally deleted myself cuz it had one of my emails as the contact … I deleted it and then I wasn’t in any contact list which I don’t get why it wouldn’t have been kept in the iCloud list but to try to get it restored took almost an hour on the phone with Support and only one part of the problem was resolved due to the associate not knowing what to do and blamed the rest on gmail.
So I’m still at square one 🙄
I just wanted to know how to add email address to my iPhone 15. I don’t know why it’s such a problem to give straight on directions how to do this I have been trying for weeks on end and no help from Apple that I pay all this money to every year. Come on get off your *** and help me do something here.
The issue is with iOS and new phones. All contacts been added saves as Gmail contacts rather than iCloud contacts. When trying to switch off Gmail account all contacts get deleted. There's no sync either.
This ABSOLUTELY worked for me. I'm so happy in fact that I created this community account just to thank you for this one post. The fact that EVERYBODY I emailed at my job, their emails automatically populated into my iphone contacts and it was driving me freakin crazy. This went on for MONTHS. I was manually deleting them on a semi-daily basis until today. Thank you again for posting this. It was a lifesaver.
Are you sure you are not looking at “Siri found in…” suggestions ?
Yes me too. I would love to know how to make it stop.
Contacts being added automatically on iPhone
