If we have owned an iPhone for a long time, we will certainly have accumulated a large amount of contacts in the address book and we do not want to lose them for any reason. To avoid any type of risk, it is better to synchronize your iPhone with iCloud, so as to automatically save all new contacts and update the backup every time we add a new one. In addition, the contacts on the smartphone can be viewed from any computer, just have the appropriate client or visit the prepared Web page.
In this guide we will show you all the steps to follow in order to synchronize the address book from iPhone to PC with iCloud, so that you always have your contacts at hand.
In addition to enabling synchronization, we will also show you how to install iCloud on PC and how to recover saved contacts, so that you can view them from your computer screen.
READ ALSO: Back up the iPhone address book by saving the contacts in Google
Enable contact sync on iPhone
To get the synchronization of contacts on iPhone, we open the Settings app, select Apple ID at the top and, among the various items, select iCloud . If the menu does not appear, we will be asked for access credentials to the cloud service: we insert those relating to the Apple account with which we want to use synchronization. In the new window that appears, make sure that the button next to the Contacts item is active.
From now on all the contacts in the address book will be kept safe on iCloud, so as never to lose them (in the unfortunate event that the iPhone is broken or stolen).
The same configuration can be made by going to the Settings app, then in the Password and account -> iCloud path and finally activating the switch next to the Contacts item.
If we also want to synchronize other elements, we enable the button next to each of them, so that we can save a greater number of elements from the phone to the PC.
In both cases, the synchronization of contacts and iCloud elements will be carried out both when the iPhone is connected to a Wi-Fi network and when it is connected in LTE or 3G to the operator's network in use. The operation requires very little bandwidth so we can safely leave it active even if we have a subscription to the Internet with little traffic.
Install iCloud on PC
After activating the synchronization on the iPhone, it's time to show you how to install the iCloud client on the Windows PC; Unfortunately, at the moment there is no real integration of the contacts within the Microsoft operating system, but we can still view them if we have Microsoft Outlook as a mail program and calendar / contact management.
We open any web browser (Edge or Chrome) and open the page intended for the download of the client for Windows. We then download the installer and start it, so as to add iCloud to our computer. We restart the PC when requested and, after returning online, open the iCloud program, activate all the items on the screen (in particular Mail, contacts, calendars and tasks ) then click Apply .
Once this is done, we will see our contacts appear in Outlook: on the left side of the versions of the iCloud Mail account will be displayed, containing all the contacts saved on the phone. If we don't have Outlook installed on our computer (which we remind you is part of the Office suite), we recommend you read our guide to download Office 2019 for Windows 10 .
On the Mac, however, the problem does not exist: iCloud is perfectly integrated into the system and allows you to synchronize contacts easily, by activating the relative item in the client settings already present.
After that, we open the Launchpad and click on Contacts, so as to immediately display the numbers saved on the iPhone also on the Mac.
READ ALSO: How to use iCloud on Windows, Mac, iPhone and iPad
Alternatives to iCloud to synchronize contacts
If we are looking for valid alternatives to iCloud to synchronize the contacts in the iPhone address book, we can use the free Sync Contacts app for Google.
Using this app we can automatically synchronize all the contacts on the iPhone in the online address book managed by Google, so that we can view it without problems from the Google Contacts website. These contacts can also be synchronized on an Android smartphone or used within other Google services, such as Gmail.
Another valid alternative to iCloud to save contacts involves the use of the iTunes backup, with which we can regularly save all the contacts (plus other items) within our PC, so that we can restore them calmly in case of problems or recover the address book if our iPhone is lost or broken. In this regard, we advise you to read our guide to iTunes, so as to know the options and functions to manage the iPhone from the computer .
If you find it difficult with the Apple program and you just want to make a backup of the phone book or other iPhone data without using any Apple program, we can use the excellent AirMore program that allows you to transfer many saved items to the iPhone without iTunes and above all without iCloud.
The last method that we recommend to be able to transfer contacts involves the use of vCards, as described in our guide on how to transfer contacts if you change your phone or SIM (with Android and iPhone) .
Along the lines of the article recommended above, we recommend reading the article below, where we will be able to find all the useful apps to synchronize contacts from iPhone to Android smartphone, useful in case we have changed phones and operating systems.
READ ALSO: App to synchronize contacts from iPhone to Android and Samsung mobiles
