Sync Contacts across Devices

Your contact list (or address book) contains important details about the people you interact with online and in real life, and it stands to reason you’ll want to have the same details available no matter which device (Mac or iOS) you’re using at the moment. You’ll also want changes, additions, and deletions you make on one device to appear on all your others.

This sort of thing used to require periodic (and error-prone) manual syncing, but nowadays is generally easy and reliable thanks to cloud services such as iCloud, Google Contacts, and Exchange servers, all of which offer near-instantaneous push updates from one device to your others.

As long as you have an account with one of these services, all you need to do is make sure each of your devices is configured correctly.

Sync Contacts on a Mac

Go to System Preferences > Internet Accounts.
If the account you want to use for syncing contacts (iCloud, Exchange, Google, or CardDAV) is not already listed, click the account type on the right and follow the prompts to add it.
Select the account in the list on the left.
Make sure Contacts is selected ①.

**①** To sync contacts from a cloud service such as Google with Contacts on your Mac, make sure Contacts is selected. — ① To sync contacts from a cloud service such as Google with Contacts on your Mac, make sure Contacts is selected.

Your contacts from the selected cloud service should now be syncing with your Mac.

Sync Contacts in iOS

Tap Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars.
If the account you want to use for syncing contacts (iCloud, Exchange, Google, or CardDAV) is not already listed at the top, tap Add Account and follow the prompts to add it.
Tap the account name and make sure Contacts is turned on for that account.

Your contacts from the selected cloud service should now be syncing with your iOS device.

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