Exporting contacts from the Contacts app to a spreadsheet may seem impossible until you learn one simple trick. You can also export a spreadsheet to a CSV format and import contacts into the app.
Comments: 12 Responses to “Importing and Exporting Contacts On a Mac”
Jeff
2 weeks ago
I consider myself above-average at manipulating text and data but never spent the time trying to understand how to import or export Contacts data. Nice tutorial on how to do this. Very helpful. Thanks so much.
Henry Halem
2 weeks ago
I can see how to print my contacts but I cannot find a way to adjust the column width for printing. It seems as if I’m stuck with the width a default width.
Jim: Go to that group, select all of those contacts, export to Numbers like I show in the video.
Lyn Erickson
2 weeks ago
I tried to follow these directions as I would very much like to transfer both ways. I created blank spreadsheet in Numbers – opened contacts ( I have 788 contacts) highlighted all / dragged them to spreadsheet / a dialogue box comes up and says ‘Spreadsheet is updating’ but then it is always blank. I highlighted 10 contacts and went through same process and it worked. Do you have to use small groups? (I have extra characters… just want to thank you for all your shares…)
Lyn: Could be that 788 is too many. Maybe try 200 at a time? Or, maybe it is a particular entry. Try some at a time to narrow it down.
Adam
2 weeks ago
That was a really great and helpful video in many ways. I am saving a link to this for later, and also forwarding to friends and family who use Macs. Thanks for making this one!
Murray Cater
2 weeks ago
this was a great video & timely as well. so “exported” into numbers, edited the rows & columns down to just under 400 lines. saved it as a CSV. imported into contacts & got over a total of 632 lines. the extra’s are bits & pieces of other contacts.
Simon Caust
1 week ago
Thanks Gary, I’ve been needing to do this to tidy up my nearly 4000 contacts. Like Lyn It wouldn’t handle them all so I did it letter by letter.
Justin Ross
1 week ago
Hey Gary, thank you for the video. I’ve watched several times but having troubles on one of my machines. It’s only bringing over 4 fields and and out of order. For example if I have an email listed under “other email” it’s just brining over first and last name of that person. No address at all. Any remedy?
Justin: Is that particular machine using an older version of macOS maybe? If it works on your other machines, just do it there instead unless you can figure out the problem.
Leave a New Comment Related to "Importing and Exporting Contacts On a Mac"
I consider myself above-average at manipulating text and data but never spent the time trying to understand how to import or export Contacts data. Nice tutorial on how to do this. Very helpful. Thanks so much.
I can see how to print my contacts but I cannot find a way to adjust the column width for printing. It seems as if I’m stuck with the width a default width.
Henry: Maybe bring them into Numbers like I show and customize them there.
Can I just export contacts in a group?
Jim: Go to that group, select all of those contacts, export to Numbers like I show in the video.
I tried to follow these directions as I would very much like to transfer both ways. I created blank spreadsheet in Numbers – opened contacts ( I have 788 contacts) highlighted all / dragged them to spreadsheet / a dialogue box comes up and says ‘Spreadsheet is updating’ but then it is always blank. I highlighted 10 contacts and went through same process and it worked. Do you have to use small groups? (I have extra characters… just want to thank you for all your shares…)
Lyn: Could be that 788 is too many. Maybe try 200 at a time? Or, maybe it is a particular entry. Try some at a time to narrow it down.
That was a really great and helpful video in many ways. I am saving a link to this for later, and also forwarding to friends and family who use Macs. Thanks for making this one!
this was a great video & timely as well. so “exported” into numbers, edited the rows & columns down to just under 400 lines. saved it as a CSV. imported into contacts & got over a total of 632 lines. the extra’s are bits & pieces of other contacts.
Thanks Gary, I’ve been needing to do this to tidy up my nearly 4000 contacts. Like Lyn It wouldn’t handle them all so I did it letter by letter.
Hey Gary, thank you for the video. I’ve watched several times but having troubles on one of my machines. It’s only bringing over 4 fields and and out of order. For example if I have an email listed under “other email” it’s just brining over first and last name of that person. No address at all. Any remedy?
Justin: Is that particular machine using an older version of macOS maybe? If it works on your other machines, just do it there instead unless you can figure out the problem.