How To Airdrop Contacts To New Iphone

How to transfer contacts from iPhone to iPhone 13?

Just ordered a new iPhone 13 in Apple Store. I have a lot of contacts on my old iPhone 8 and want to transfer all of them to my new iPhone 13. Anybody could tell move the contacts in the shortest time?

- Question from Apple Community

It is so exciting to have a new iPhone 13/12/11/SE with its outstanding hardware and new iOS features. However, when you switch to a new iPhone, you don't want to lose data, especially the contacts information.

Contacts are one of the most important parts of data on your iPhone. They are indispensable when you want to make a call, or send a message or Email. To make your data safe and let you better use your new iPhone 13/12. This guide will give you useful advice to transfer data from iPhone to iPhone.

How to copy all the contacts or just some of them to another iPhone? This guide will give very detailed ways to do that.

Section 1. Transfer contacts from iPhone to iPhone without iTunes/iCloud(support different Apple ID)
Section 2. Sync contacts from iPhone to iPhone with iCloud
Section 3. Restore contacts to new iPhone from iCloud backup
Section 4. Send contacts to iPhone via iCloud
Section 5. Import contacts to iPhone 12 using iTunes
Section 6. Share contacts between iPhone with AirDrop

Section 1. Transfer contacts from iPhone to iPhone without iTunes/iCloud

AOMEI MBackupper is a powerful and popular iOS backup and transfer tool that enables you to transfer contacts from one iPhone to another iPhone easily. And it can be one of the fattest iPhone contact transferring tools. It is tested that transferring 3000 contacts can be finished in 9 seconds. Below are some features and advantages of this software to making it to be your best choice.

Preview and select: It allows you to preview and select the contacts on your iPhone. It can save your time if you don't want to move the whole contacts.
Transfer all data from iPhone to iPhone: Its "iPhone to iPhone Transfer" tool helps you to transfer all data on your current device to switch to a new iPhone.
Full compatibility with iOS: It works well with all iPhone models, including iPhone 13,12,11, X, 8, 7, 6, SE, as well as iPad, and iPod Touch.
Support different Apple ID: If the source and target iPhone are using different Apple IDs, this tool can help you transfer data from one Apple ID to another Apple ID.

Download AOMEI MBackupper and connect old iPhone to computer with USB cable. If this is the first time you connect old iPhone to computer, you need to tap Trust This Computer on it. Then follow the steps below to see how to transfer contacts from iPhone to iPhone without iCloud or iTunes.

Step 1. Click "Transfer to computer" on the main interface.

transfer to computer

Step 2. Press the "+" icon and select contacts. And you can choose the specific contacts.

select contacts

Step 3. Choose storage path and format, and click "Transfer" to save the contacts.

transfer

Step 4. Disconnect the old iPhone, and connect your new iPhone with the computer, click the "Transfer to iPhone" option on the main interface.

transfer to iphone

Step 6. Press the "+" icon and choose the contacts you just saved on the computer. Then hit "Transfer" to save them on the target iPhone.

transfer contacts

Section 2. Sync contacts from iPhone to iPhone 13/12 with iCloud

iCloud is a very convenient application on iPhone. You can use it to sync contacts on all your Apple device signed in with the same Apple ID. The disadvantage is that you cannot keep different contacts on different devices. iPhone contacts and iCloud contacts will be merged and all the devices will keep the same contacts if you turn on iCloud Contacts. Connect both iPhone to the Internet and follow the steps:

1. Go to Settings on old iPhone > tap [your name] > select iCloud > turn on the button of Contacts.

2. Repeat the same procedures on your new iPhone to enable iCloud Contact.

Enable Contacts Sync

Section 3. Restore contacts to new iPhone from full iCloud backup

If you have a complete iPhone backup in iCloud, it would be convenient to start to use your new iPhone 13/12, but your contacts might not be in that backup. According to the rule of iCloud backup, if you have turn on the button of Contacts in iCloud before you make that iCloud backup, the contacts will not be saved to the backup. If you are not sure for that, you can download iCloud backup to computer to see whether your contacts have been saved.

If your new iPhone has been set up, you need to erase this iPhone and then you can use iCloud backup to restore iPhone. After you restart the new device, sign in your Apple ID and select Restore from iCloud Backup.

Restore From iCloud Backup

Section 4. Send contacts to iPhone 12 using iCloud

What if you want to use new iPhone with different Apple ID? The best way is using AOMEI MBackupper in method 1, and iCloud can still do this for you. You can even use this way to access iCloud if iPhone is broken.

Step 1. Switch on the button of Contacts in iCloud on your old iPhone as in Section 2.

Step 2. Go to icloud.com and sign in the Apple ID of your old iPhone. Select the contacts you want to transfer and click Export vCard to download contacts from iCloud to iPhone.

Transfer Contacts From iPhone

Step 3. Sign in the new Apple ID on the site. Click Import vCard to upload contacts to iCloud.

Import vCard

Step 4. Switch on iCloud Contacts on your new iPhone.

Section 5. Import contacts to new iPhone using iTunes

iTunes is able to sync contacts from computer to iPhone. You could use it to transfer contacts from old iPhone to iPhone 13. If you saved contacts from iCloud to computer like in Outlook, Follow this guide to see how to transfer contacts from iPhone to iPhone using iTunes.

1. Get contacts off iPhone from iCloud as in section 4 and save them to Outlook.

2. Connect iPhone to the latest iTunes and tap the device icon in the upper-left corner.

3. Select Info in the sidebar, check Sync Contacts and click Apply.

Sync Contacts to Outlook via iTunes

Section 6. Share contacts between iPhone with AirDrop

Airdrop is a file-sharing app designed for iOS devices. You could also use it to transfer songs from iPhone to iPhone or share a file, photo, videos between Apple devices. But it does not perform well in transfer a large number of contacts or files to your iPhone.

Step 1. Enable Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on both iPhone. Swipe down from the upper-left corner to enable AirDrop on the target iPhone.

Step 2. Select contact on the source iPhone and select Share Contacts.

Step 3. Tap the name of the target device and it would receive the information of the contact.

Airdrop Contacts from iPhone to iPhone

Conclusion

You have got 6 ways about how to transfer contacts from iPhone to iPhone 13/12/11/X/SE to transfer selected or all the contacts to your new iPhone. You can choose a method according to your need.

AOMEI MBackupper is suitable for the most conditions to share all contacts. It's free and transfers contacts in the shortest time. Besides, you leave the copy of contacts on a computer to give the insurance of iPhone data.