best way to clean up duplicate contacts?

By Brian Giles, 1 April, 2017

Forum
iOS and iPadOS

Hi all,

I have my iPhone and Mac syncing contacts with iCloud and am wanting to clean them up so I can make more use of them with Siri. Almost all of my contacts are listed twice, and there might be a few listed a third time. The only ones that are only listed once are ones that I've recently added to my phone. I'm not sure what caused them to be duplicated. Anyone got any good suggestions to resolve this? I don't sync my phone with iTunes anymore and don't want to either. Merging or deleting the extra contacts would take way too long, especially on the phone, and I don't want them to come back when I back up to iCloud again. If I can figure out a good way to clean my contact list up, I could, at least in theory, delete them all from iCloud and then sync the updated list from the iPhone or MBP.

Any ideas? Thanks!

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Comments

By Sam N on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Just so you know, the app above has a lot of major Voiceover issues and doesn't get the job done, and is a paid app. Over all, a horrible recommendation. I, too, am having issues with this and would like a realistic recommendation that is accessible and effective.

By Elijah76 on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Ok thhen try this

Cleanup Duplicate Contacts – Address Book Cleaner by Business Contacts Solutions, LLC
https://appsto.re/my/v1FNE.i

By Sam N on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Here's an app that still has some unlabeled buttons. I actually purchased this one a long time ago, so I don't know how much it is. I deleted it a while back because I didn't like something about it--it was so long ago that I can't entirely remember what. Anyway, I just re-downloaded it, restored my in-app purchase, and gave it a go, and it's quite powerful. Like I said, it definitely has some Voiceover issues, but it's usable and intuitive.

Cleaner Pro - Remove Duplicate Contacts by YT Development Ltd
https://appsto.re/us/D0h8E.i

By Sam N on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

In reply to by Elijah76

Arvind, just because you post a link to the free version doesn't make it work any better with Voiceover.

By Elijah76 on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

I just tested it and it works fine with voice over, the app that you had posted works well too, thanks for your uplifting comments; cheers

By Brian Giles on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Is there not a good way to do this without having to buy another app?

By Elijah76 on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Hi brian,
I tested this app and it works perfectly with voice over and it's free; try it

Cleanup Duplicate Contacts – Address Book Cleaner by Business Contacts Solutions, LLC
https://appsto.re/my/v1FNE.i
I just cleaned up my duplicates in one click; smiley

By DPinWI on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Recently, I noticed that I had a mess of duplicates, and some triplicates, in my iPhone contacts. Upon inspection, I saw it was related to Facebook contacts. i checked the Groups setting at the top of the Contacts screen and found several selections for Facebook contacts were enabled, along with my iCloud, GMail, and Hotmail contacts. I selected only one of the Facebook contact settings, and all the duplicates disappeared.

So, in my case anyways, it wasn't a case of actual duplicates, but of a settings issue.

By Elijah76 on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Touche dpi w i
Will have to check my setting too,
Thanks

By Sam N on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

I tried messing around in those settings before, and I lost contacts that way. I unselected Facebook contacts, and my old exchange contacts, and a bunch of my duplicates disappeared, but so did some contacts entirely. When I went to reselect all contacts to bring back the contacts and just deal with the duplicates, some of my contacts never came back. This could have been a bug in one of the older versions of iOS, but it has kept me from fiddling with those options.

That Cleaner Pro has a free version, too, but I forget how useful it is. So many of these apps show you what they can do with the free version, and then make you pay to actually do it. What's nice about free versions, though, is that you can test accessibility with them and have no skin in the game.

Arvind, you must not be a Voiceover user. If Applevis allowed general submitions, I'd post a review of your app to show you just how wrong you are. Luckily, since there is a free version, people can figure it out on their own.

By Elijah76 on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

There is no use arguing with you sam, and i am fully a voice over user, and there is nothing to check,
Most free apps have in app purchases to raemove those annoying adds, this app however is free, just click on the link below and you'll see how easy it is to remove duplicate contacts,

https://www.dropbox.com/s/10gw0uh05pjsqxy/clean%20up%20dupes.m4a?dl=0

If the app had some in app purchase, i really do not remember paying for it, i may or may not have paid for it,
And sam, you do not have to proof anything,
I have been totally blind and am fully a voice over user,
Well i may be wrong but i think clean up dupes is a good and free app.
Thanks

By Elijah76 on Friday, April 14, 2017 - 16:55

Now sam you got it wrong. The app that you had demonstrated was the first app which i had suggested,. After your first comments however, i checked the app myself and the app indeed was difficult to navigate with all it's unlabelled buttons, but if you were paying attention, you would have realized that i had suggested a 2nd app which is free and is accessible. There are just 2 buttons at the bottom of the app which are unlabelled but it's no rocket science to determine what those buttons do and then label them,
The app you demonstrated was for the first app which is the clean up suite.
I'm not trying to steer up anybody, i was just trying to help by contributing back to the v i / blind society,.
I am pretty sure people would have found the second app much more accessible, the link once again is below;

https://appsto.re/my/v1FNE.i
It's called clean up dupes,
Thanks

Thanks
Arvind
Arvind