How to restore contacts on iPhone without backup (iCloud or iTunes)

All my iPhone contacts disappeared...I logged out iCloud and signed in again and then slid the syncing on, but nothing happened...it seems I forgot to make a backup in iCloud. How can I get back contacts on iPhone without backup?

iPhone allows you to add as many phone numbers as needed to the Contacts app. You can use the saved info to make a phone call, text your friends, send an email, etc. Contacts are so important in your daily life that if you lost contacts on iPhone, the entire world can seem just out of reach.

When this happened, how can you restore contacts to iPhone without backup? Firstly, check if there are any misconfigured settings that may keep you from viewing the entire contacts list. This happens sometimes when you tap the wrong button in the middle of fiddling with your iPhone. However, many contacts losing issues have kept cropping up because of systems upgrade, synchronization or improper deletion.

Worse still, people usually don't realize how important it's to create iPhone backup before the contacts are gone. This could be a big deal for many users, and searching for workable advice to recover iPhone contacts without a backup is urgent than ever before.

iPhone Contacts Recovery Software

Don't panic, the world is not coming to an end. There are a lot of ways in which you will be able to fix the issue yourself and restore contacts on iPhone without iTunes or iCloud backup files. Let's take a look at just one tool that has always proved its high success rate — iOS Data Recovery.

The application offers three options for any files recovery task: scan iPhone memory and restore contacts without backup needed, restore from iCloud and extract from iTunes backup. All you need to do is connect the iPhone to computer for running a deep scan, preview and recover deleted contacts, and eventually you should be able to get access to contacts in your iPhone's address book. It has more to cover: photos, text messages, call logs, notes and other file types.

The software also has backup function that can be greatly beneficial if you want to back up iPhone data in future. Now, let's have a look how it recovers your contacts disappeared from iPhone.

Recovering Deleted Contacts on iPhone Without iCloud or iTunes Backup

Step 1: Choose "Recover from iOS Device" mode

Start up the program on computer, and you will be given the options to choose any suitable mode to start from. Just select "Recover from iOS Device" mode so that you can retrieve deleted contacts from iPhone storage without any iCloud or iTunes backup.

Then, get your iPhone plugged into the machine and wait for the connection.

Step 2: Scan iPhone to search for deleted contacts

In the next window that opens, you'll be asked which type of data you want to recover. Select Contacts and then Scan to start scanning entire iPhone. After a few minutes or so, all the items including contacts will be shown on the window in a categorized way.

Step 3: Preview and select deleted iPhone contacts

You are able to preview the items of every data kind by clicking the specific category — click on "Contacts" category and you can see the contact details on the middle pane.

Do note that you can toggle the "Only display the deleted item(s)" switch to ON position to view just the lost contacts.

Next, select what contact you want to restore from iPhone. To select all deleted contacts, put a checkmark next to the "Contacts" category on the left sidebar. To choose individual contacts, simply check each one on the middle pane.

Step 4: Begin restoring iPhone contacts without backup

At last, press the Recover button at the bottom-right corner. When a dialog box shows up, choose a location on the computer to save the recovered contacts. Do it as required.

Updated: The software has been introduced a function that will restore contacts back onto iPhone's Contacts app. Hit the Recover to Device button and you're ready to go.

Now that you finally specify the destination directory, press the Recover button again to begin recover contacts from iPhone without backup. The resulting files will then be immediately saved as HTML or CSV file to your chosen path.

That's it! You can now view the contacts on the machine and transfer them back to your iPhone.

Hold onto your iPhone for years and plan to switch to Android platform? Great. If you want to take all contacts with you check out our another article on how to migrate contacts from iPhone to Android instantly for an easy way to finish it.

Watch Video Guide: How to Get Contacts Back on iPhone without Backup

Conclusion

iOS Data Recovery makes it a reasonable chance of getting back contacts on iPhone even though you didn't produce a solid iTunes or iCloud backup previously. On a side note, the best defense against contacts (or any other file) loss on your device is do backups regularly.