Where to store contacts in android. Saving contacts on Android

People buy Android smartphones because of the amazing capabilities of mobile devices and the low cost. However, many users forget that, like any electronic device, smartphones can be damaged or stolen. Therefore, it is recommended to copy important data from the smartphone to external devices such as a computer or SD card from time to time.

Contacts are the most important data on any smartphone. Regularly backing up contact numbers will allow you to quickly and easily recover important data in case you lose or break your Android smartphone.

If you don't know how to copy your contacts to your Android device, we will tell you about two simple methods. The instructions are very simple, so even a beginner can handle it.

Method 1: Copy Contacts to SD Card

The easiest way to copy contacts on your Android smartphone is to transfer them to your SD card. How to do it? Read on.

Step 1: Open the Contacts app on your smartphone and select the Settings option. You will be presented with a list of available options. In our case, you need to select Import / Export.

Step 2: After that, another menu will open, in which you need to select the "Export to SD card" option.

Thus, you copy your contacts to an SD card, thereby providing access to important phones even in the event of theft or loss of a mobile device.

You can also export contacts to a VCF file and then copy this file to a safe place, for example, your personal computer.

Method 2: Copy Contacts to Gmail Inbox

The second method allows you to copy contact numbers on your Android smartphone to your Gmail mailbox.

This requires:

Step 1: Open the settings menu of your Android device and click "Accounts" or "Accounts and sync".

Step 2: Go to your Gmail account and check the sync contacts option. It will take a few minutes to copy your contacts to your Gmail inbox.

Once the process is complete, you can go to contacts.google.com via your computer and click on More - Export. Then you will see a complete list of your contacts on your smartphone.

You can select all contacts, or specific ones, then click on "More" and "Export".

This way you can copy contacts from your Android device to your computer.

Hello!
Earlier, I described the process of creating a backup using. Today we will talk about how to save your Android contacts without using any available tools 🙂

First, what are the advantages? And such that contacts are saved in a VCF file. And the file itself can be stored on the phone, on a memory card, save contacts to a computer, upload them to any cloud storage for safekeeping, etc. It turns out somehow more reliable, isn't it? 🙂 And at any time the information from this file can be restored.
What is VCF? It is an acronym for VCard File. This file format is used to store contact information. Such as, for example, name, phone number, email address, etc.
Now let's move on to the very process of backing up contacts on your Android device.
We take the phone, go to “Contacts” - “Settings” - “Contacts”. Here we see the item "Import / Export Contacts".

We go into it. Here you will be prompted to export data to the device memory or to an SD memory card (if you have one, of course). Choose the option that suits you and confirm the action. That's it, the VCF file is created and saved on your phone.

In order to restore contacts from this file, we do the reverse operation. Select "Import from device memory / SD card".
Menu items may differ slightly depending on the smartphone model, operating system version, etc. But you will figure it out, I'm sure of that 🙂
In such a simple way, you can easily export and import your contacts to Android.

The list of contacts in smartphones based on Android is a file located in the device's memory. Some users ask where is this file stored and how to get it? The answer may surprise you.

As for the file with contacts itself, it is located at the following address: /data/data/com.android.providers.contacts/databases/, the file with contacts itself is called either contacts.db or contacts2.db. Another thing is that it is not always possible to get to this file - the file manager needs root rights. If you have them installed, then you can find the specified file. This is how it looks:

However, I would like to note that there is no point in getting into the jungle of the device's file system, because it is much easier to export contacts to the partition you need. To do this, open contacts, click on the "Menu" button and select "Import / Export" (sometimes these two sections are listed separately in the menu, you need export).

Then select the section you want to export. You can save contacts as a file, for example, in the internal memory of the device, and then, if necessary, transfer the file to another medium, including a computer.

As you can see, everything is very simple.

Each user has a large amount of contact data stored in his Android smartphone, from a mobile phone to ICQ, email and other services, including social networks. Sometimes it becomes necessary to change the phone, respectively, you have to copy all contacts to another device. What should the user do in this case? How can I transfer contacts from Android to Android?

Android developers envisioned this capability and implemented several standard tools for copying and moving contact information. There are also specialized programs with which the user can copy data in a few clicks. We will tell you about each method separately!

Basic ways to transfer contacts between Android devices

Saving to Sim-card
Bluetooth transmission

This is not a complete list of ways to transfer contacts to Android, but mostly users choose one of the above options.

Let's describe each of them in detail.

Method 1 - Saving contacts to a SIM card

As a rule, users change their phones, and the SIM card remains the same. In this case, you can copy the contact data to the SIM, and export the data from this card to the new phone.

The only drawback of this method is the limited amount of SIM memory. It is done like this:

To save contact information, go to your phone settings.
Select the "More" tab, and click on the menu item called "SIM card management".
Next, click on the "Copy contact information to SIM" tab. You will need to click "OK" to confirm the operation.
A notification will appear on the screen that the copying process has begun. It usually takes from several seconds to 5 minutes, depending on the parameters of the phone and the amount of information transferred.
As soon as you insert the SIM card into the new phone, you will have a complete list of contact details from the old device! Don't forget to transfer them to your phone.

Also, on some older devices, usually running Android 2.3, you can perform a similar action as follows:

Method 2 - Sync to Google

Android smartphones have built-in functions for syncing data, and contacts are no exception. You can easily save contacts in the Google cloud under your account, and then transfer them to a new device as soon as you log in with your username and password.

How to sync

You need to go to the main menu, select the "Synchronization" item in your account and synchronize all data. You can access them both from a mobile phone and from a computer by logging into the official Google website under your account. Remember that sync can be turned on by default. In this case, all changes will be automatically saved on the server!
You can also use the contacts.google.com service. Go to this page and log in with your account. Select the More tab. If you need to save contact information in a separate file, then select the "Export" item. If you already have a file with contacts and want to attach it to your account, then select the "Import" tab and specify the path to the file. Thus, you can easily transfer data from one Android device to another, view a separate contact with all the data in Excel and other similar programs.
The Contacts service provides the ability to integrate with other services, combine similar data, view the contacts with whom you most often communicate. You can also view additional data if the user has filled in some information about himself.

Method 3 - Bluetooth transmission

This is a separate feature that allows you to transfer contact information using Bluetooth wireless technology from your old device to a new one. And by default it is activated when you turn on a new phone. If you have not used it before, then follow the steps below:

Select the "Contacts" tab and click the "Data transfer" menu item.
Click "Next" and select the brand of the phone from the list (the phone from which the data will be transferred).
Click "Next" again and select your smartphone model from the general list. The built-in help system will help you with this.
Press the "Next" button again and turn on the Bluetooth wireless connection on your old device, where the contact information is stored.
Within a few seconds, the system will display a complete list of devices, in which you will need to select your device.
To sync with the old smartphone, a special password will be requested on the new one. Once the password is entered, a list of contacts will appear. Select all the records you want to migrate and click the Next tab. Within a few minutes, all records will be sent to a new phone!

conclusions

All of the above methods work great and allow you to transfer and copy contacts from Android to Android without any problems. It is also worth considering the fact that a huge number of applications have been developed for this OS that allow not only saving contacts, but also creating backups to send them by mail, store them in the cloud.

For example, you often have to add new people to your smartphone's notebook. It is difficult and not always convenient to do it manually all the time. A special program with a given algorithm can do this for you, for example, on certain days!

Here are some of the top 3 apps:

Helium App Sync and Backup.
Super Backup.
Mobile Backup & Restore.

Transferring contacts from your phone is the first question that arises when you change your Android device or update the firmware. We will tell you how to quickly and safely save all contacts and easily transfer them to another device, be it a PC or directly to Android.

There are many ways to transfer contacts and a phone book, we have created instructions for the simplest and most universal ways, choose the one that suits you: but keep in mind that to transfer to a PC you will need at least a USB cable or a Bluetooth receiver.

Transferring contacts from Android to Android using Google sync

This is the easiest way to transfer the phone book when changing firmware or updating the device, and no third-party applications or complex manipulations are required at all. The default sync function is built into Google services installed on the device, it allows you to save data in the cloud for transfer:

How to transfer contacts to Android using PC

We need: a previous phone with support for connecting via USB cable and the USB cable itself, or a PC and a phone with Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.
Our task is to save the phone book in 1 file in CSV or VCF format and transfer it to a new phone. Most old phones do not have such a built-in function, so we use a computer and a program that supports a large number of phones from different manufacturers MOBILedit! (you can also use your manufacturer's program to synchronize data - they are usually found on the official sites).

This method is focused on transferring contacts from an old phone to a modern Android device, but in general it is universal.

Instructions

We will talk in more detail about transferring the .csv file of contacts to Google, because this is the most convenient of all methods and it has many advantages:

automatic synchronization with new contacts on your android in the presence of the Internet, if this function is enabled in the phone
you can edit contacts even without a phone
transfer contacts to any other android just by specifying your account
recover deleted contacts within 30 days
automatically or manually merge duplicate contacts from different services (phone book, social networks, email services, etc.)

To do this, you must have mail from gmail.com. How to set up mail in Gmail, what else do you need an account in the Google Play market for, and what opportunities you will get after registration is described in detail in the article: Registering and setting up the Play Market.

Instructions for importing .csv copy of contacts to Google

By the way, in absolutely the same way you can export all numbers from your google account, when transferred to a device with a non-Android operating system.

How to transfer contacts to Android without a PC

The choice of method how to transfer contacts to android without a PC depends on the capabilities of your previous phone... Let's analyze the main ones:

Via bluetooth

Connect your 2 devices: to do this, turn on Bluetooth on both phones, on the android device go to: Settings - Bluetooth - checkmark (slider) on "Visibility to other devices". In the previous phone, go to the Bluetooth settings and turn on the search for a new device, select your android in the list and confirm the connection - for this you will need to enter any identical numbers (password) on both devices.

Highlight the contacts you need to transfer: in the options (functions) of the phone book of your previous phone, look for "Select multiple" or "Select all" (if you don't find such an option, try first pressing "Send (Send) via Bluetooth", and perhaps here your phone will offer to select several contacts). Not all phones have this feature, so you may need to migrate each contact individually or choose a different method. And the lucky ones need to select send via Bluetooth in the functions and wait a little.

Save contacts to SD card (not all regular phones support)

In the phone book options of the phone, find "Save contacts to SD memory card", then install it in the android device and go to: Contacts - Options - Import / Export - SD card.

Via SIM card

This method is used in the most hopeless situation (the previous phone is just a "dialer" without additional features), since the number of contacts that you can transfer at a time is about 200 (depending on the SIM card capacity) and the name length is limited.

You need to transfer contacts to the SIM-card memory on the old phone and install it into a new android device (if you have a large phone book, then this action will have to be done several times, remembering the name you stopped at).

So, in this article we have discussed how to transfer contacts to Android in the most convenient, simple and fast ways.

Choose the method of transferring contacts to android that suits you and be sure to sync them with your google account or at least save your phone book on a PC or any cloud storage, for example, Google Drive, and you will always have access to them, regardless of the location or state of your android device.