How to get contacts unlinked from old email and put onto iCloud

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How to get contacts unlinked from old email and put onto iCloud

I have an OLD hotmail account I haven't used in 10+ years that I was using as my Windows Live login when I had a Windows phone a few years ago. I linked it when I got my iPhone, and I think it became associated with a lot of my contacts. Now, I don't have the people's numbers saved in the Hotmail account, which has been deactivated due to inactivity (but I can still log in if I so desired) but those contacts are attached to that email address in my phone. There are about 50 of them and are all the important ones, my oldest friends and family etc. Lately I've been having issues with my phone and have either had to restore it or my contacts just disappear out of the blue, and every time I have to re-sync it with three different email addresses to get all my contacts. I really want to get the contacts unassociated with the Hotmail account and have them all together on my iCloud. It seems like it should be something fairly straightforward and simple, but I cannot figure it out. Any insight? Thanks in advance.

iPhone 4S, Windows 7

Posted on Mar 10, 2014 7:48 PM

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Answer 1

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randers4

Level 9

63,525 points

Mar 10, 2014 7:58 PM in response to nogdejxibtdly

To do this, do the following:

Reactivate and sync the Hotmail contacts back to you phone. Confirm that they appear in the Contacts app.
Go to Settings>iCloud, turn Contacts to Off, choose Delete from My iDevice when prompted (any iCloud contacts will still be in iCloud).
Download the app My Contacts Backup. Use the app to back up the remaining contacts on your phone (from Hotmail) as a vCard attachment to an email that you send to yourself. Confirm that you have received the email.
Go to Settings>iCloud and turn Contacts back to On.
Go to Settings>Mail,Contacts,Calendars>Default Account (in the Contacts section), and set this to iCloud.
Go to Settings>Mail,Contacts,Calendars…tap your Hotmail account and turn off contacts syncing with Hotmail.
Open the My Contacts Backup email and tap the attachment to import the contacts from the other accounts back to your device, and to iCloud.
Confirm that all your contacts are in iCloud, including your Hotmail contacts. If so, you can delete the Hotmail account from your phone again.

If you're having trouble with contact syncing, continue to use the app to make periodic backups of your contacts so you don't lose them.

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