cnicholson1
Level 1 (1 points)

Q: Apple Watch not importing / syncing all contacts

My Apple Watch only syncs / imports a could of dozen (out of 3000) of my contacts.  As a result, I cannot locate contact info for people I want to call/text.

MacBook Air, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5), Airport Extreme 802.11ac

Posted on Apr 30, 2015 6:06 PM

by cnicholson1,Solvedanswer
cnicholson1 cnicholson1
Level 1 (1 points)
A:

I went back and delete some contacts with weird symbols in some data fields (glitches from prior bulk imports, I assume), then unpaired/re-paired Watch and let it sync overnight.  All seems good now.  The Watch and/or Watch App should do a better job letting you know the status of syncing. 

Posted on May 1, 2015 3:53 PM

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cnicholson1

Q: Apple Watch not importing / syncing all contacts

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  • by Douglas Bailey,

    Douglas Bailey Douglas Bailey Apr 30, 2015 6:19 PM in response to cnicholson1
    Level 1 (66 points)
    Apr 30, 2015 6:19 PM in response to cnicholson1

    I'm not sure where you are seeing this but here is what I found while trying to send a message.

    In the message app I used force click and then the New Message option.

    Then click 'Add contact'. Only a few recent contacts were listed for me but... in the lower left corner of the screen there is a person's head with a plus sign. When I click that I can scroll through all of my contacts. Well at least hundreds of them - I didn't count them.

  • by redmondfromconcord,

    redmondfromconcord redmondfromconcord Apr 30, 2015 6:36 PM in response to cnicholson1
    Level 1 (15 points)
    Apr 30, 2015 6:36 PM in response to cnicholson1

    For me about 600 of 3000 synced - probably the first 600.  Also Favorites from the iPhone didn't sync (perhaps because they were all in the missing 2400?).  Also the friend wheel is all messed up - missing names, missing pics, and it also seems to use the first phone number in the contact card, which usually is home or business and not mobile, which is what I want.  I am going to try a reset...

  • by cnicholson1,Solvedanswer

    cnicholson1 cnicholson1 May 1, 2015 3:53 PM in response to redmondfromconcord
    Level 1 (1 points)
    May 1, 2015 3:53 PM in response to redmondfromconcord

    I went back and delete some contacts with weird symbols in some data fields (glitches from prior bulk imports, I assume), then unpaired/re-paired Watch and let it sync overnight.  All seems good now.  The Watch and/or Watch App should do a better job letting you know the status of syncing. 

  • by Douglas Bailey,

    Douglas Bailey Douglas Bailey May 1, 2015 4:07 PM in response to cnicholson1
    Level 1 (66 points)
    May 1, 2015 4:07 PM in response to cnicholson1

    TThat's great! Thanks for reporting back.

  • by Blfontenot,

    Blfontenot Blfontenot May 3, 2015 4:01 PM in response to cnicholson1
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 3, 2015 4:01 PM in response to cnicholson1

    I have the same issue too. Did you restore from the Apple Watch backup or just started the watch as a new one?

  • by redmondfromconcord,

    redmondfromconcord redmondfromconcord May 3, 2015 7:43 PM in response to Blfontenot
    Level 1 (15 points)
    May 3, 2015 7:43 PM in response to Blfontenot

    I have two address books synced to my iPhone - one an iCloud address book and one from an Exchange account.  I was able to "solve" my contact sync with Watch problem by turning off the Exchange address book and then reseting and starting from scratch with the Watch.  Now all 3K+ contacts are there...

  • by jeffhyman,

    jeffhyman jeffhyman Jun 23, 2015 2:27 PM in response to cnicholson1
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 23, 2015 2:27 PM in response to cnicholson1

    Were you guys able to resolve the issue? I have the same issue - won't sync contacts to the watch past the H's

    Thanks

    Jeff

  • by rpmm,

    rpmm rpmm Jul 30, 2015 12:21 PM in response to jeffhyman
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jul 30, 2015 12:21 PM in response to jeffhyman

    I am also having the same problem. Some contacts in Messages on the Watch show contact name, but some only show phone number. There don't seem to be any weird symbols in my contacts, so I am not sure if the solution here applies.

  • by sdipietr,

    sdipietr sdipietr Aug 6, 2015 8:30 PM in response to redmondfromconcord
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 6, 2015 8:30 PM in response to redmondfromconcord

    Sounds like a plan. How did you stop exchange contacts from syncing?

  • by Tcake,

    Tcake Tcake Oct 9, 2015 6:17 AM in response to cnicholson1
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Oct 9, 2015 6:17 AM in response to cnicholson1

    I have noticed that the pictures of people were not coming through in friends.  I then found that adding contact on Apple watch had names in twice as I have moved contacts to iCloud (as not synching with outlook in iOS 9).  I then unpaired the watch and re-paired it with the backup settings and all now appears ok.

     

    By the way to sync with iCloud contacts in iOS 9 (from iCloud to iPhone) you have to have at least 80% battery (or be charging it) and have to tap on iCloud settings for the sync to happen.  This is much worse than before (iOS 8) when you could pull contacts down and they synched.  So I think a few glitches/or major irritations with IOS 9.

  • by rtheron,

    rtheron rtheron Jun 28, 2016 1:18 PM in response to jeffhyman
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jun 28, 2016 1:18 PM in response to jeffhyman

    Same here, looks like all contacts I've added to my phone after the initial setup/restore to apple watch do not show up on the phone, messages from any new contacts show up as numbers on my watch, extremely frustrating....