spotlight search iOS 9 contacts not showing in results

Updates 9.01 and 9.02 didn't help. This did:

Go to Contacts > Groups and tap Hide All Contacts and then tap Show All Contacts.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/ios-9-problems/11/

Guys, been following this thread for a while and finally I think I may have found a solution. Worth a shot, it worked for me.

Here's the background (parameters of sorts)

Phone : iPhone 6, 64Gb

OS : 9.0.2

Siri Settings : ON

Spotlight Settings : Siri Suggestions : ON

Turned off ALL search results except for CONTACTS

Problem started since iOS 9.0 upgrade, and persisted till now. In between, I've also tried all the suggested solutions proposed in this forum but none worked except for one (which incidentally was meant to solve another issue regarding mobile data toggle on/off). Now I have to highlight a few key points here, I did 3 attempts to wipe out my phone before finally came to my current solution. The first 2 attempts sort of led me into my third (hopefully final) solution. So please stay with me:

First attempt that failed:

1) Wiped and restore phone from iTunes (Spotlight search contact worked),

2) Restore iCloud backup.

3) Spotlight search failed after this

Second attempt that worked for one day :

1) Wiped and restore phone from iTunes (Spotlight search contact worked),

2) Don't restore iCloud backup.

3) Then phone started automatically downloading my iCloud Contacts (Note: this is still not a iCloud backup as my SMS and Recent Calls were not restored)

4) At this point Spotlight search contact still worked

5) Proceeded to add my Gmail account

6) Problem recur after a day of use.

7) Deleted Gmail account didn't solve the issue

Third attempt that worked (2 days on and still working as I type this)

Step 1 to 5 same as second attempt, after this, since now I know it's got something to do with Contacts and Mail account, I did the following:

(NOTE: You can try the steps below immediately to see if it works without resetting the phone)

Goto Settings -> Mail,Contacts, Calendars -> Short Name (under CONTACT at bottom of page) -> do 2 things here:

Prefer Nicknames = OFF

Select : First Name & Last Initial

Not sure why or how but I did counter check every setting between my iPhone and my iPad (9.0.2, didn't have this problem) and after many rounds of trouble shooting in the contacts / mail settings, it just worked. Refer to screens below.

Hope this helps. Will keep updating you guys if this solution stops working.

i have treid all of the permutations here and it doesnt work. what is odd is that on my ipad (same account and all configurations) its works fine. very dodgy apple issue. makes spotlight sort of useless....other than as a tool for apple to follow your every step. PLEASE FIX

Yes, I can search contact but Apple engineers, if you are listening, I'd like search to work just as it did before. Search for a name and up would pop that name in contacts, email, calendar etc. Now I have to search contacts app separately. This is a big step backwards. Must fix this.

MY contacts have suddenly started appearing today in spotlight. I don't know how. It has happened randomly before too. But then I'm sure it will go away soon as before. It's not dependable basically.

Also though not an issue, the apple marketed feature of searching setting items like Bluetooth or wifi yet does not work in spotlight.

Very important parallel issue: has anyone noticed that with this spotlight problem there is another problem of not knowing which of the multiple mobile numbers stored in contacts has called.

Now I can't figure out which of the two numbers I've stored for a contact had called. Earlier the number was highlited in blue but not anymore.

Others pls confirm this issue. I have posted this in a seperate topic at Which of the multiple number called not highlited with iOS 9 .

I stand corrected. The spotlight has stopped working again for contacts.

Guys, mine has been working since I turned off my gmail contacts. It's been working since 9.0. Just my two cents. By the way, I have iCloud contacts and Microsoft contacts from work turned on.

Good luck.

Mine stopped working after a day or two. I use Spotlight mostly to find contacts, so this is an very inconvenient bug.

After upgrade on 9.02 seems work for a week. Today everything gone wrong with my Spotlight. Not fix so far

WWorked like a charm. Thanks

None of these solutions worked for me but I realized that Spotlight is now able to collect contact information from Mail to and was somehow always showing those in results to me even after I turned off Mail in spotlight so this is what I did.

Based on the suggestions above, I turned all search options off and manually switched off the phone and turned it back on.

I then turned on contacts but still no luck

So I then turned on mail and turned it off and voila it started working.

I hope this helps someone. I have not tried turning mail back as I care less about that then contacts. Will probably only do that once Apple has a solution.

I tried the fix but it did not work. I agree with another contributor: Apple is so busy squeezing money out of users that they forget to get the basics of a phone right. Please fix as soon as possible, this problem has been known for weeks now!

I stopped allowing the Facebook app to use contacts in System settings > Facebook

This seems to work for the time being. It seems that this bug somehow has to do with third party apps interfering with contacts.

Tried all suggestions but no luck for me. It's SO annoying; it was a feature i used heavily.

The only long term fix has to be done by Apple. Mine stopped working, started working, stopped working all on its own.

The most productive thing you can do now is call apple customer care and ask to talk to a tech to give them your data on what you tried. That way they can build up a list of use cases that can help pinpoint the actual problem. Im supposed to talk with a tech this week.

Phone number is

800-275-2273