How to Delete Contacts on Your iPhone

Delete an individual contact or multiple contacts

screenshot of iphone contacts app

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by Sam Costello
Sam Costello has been writing about tech since 2000. His writing has appeared in publications such as CNN.com, PC World, InfoWord, and many others.
Updated May 14, 2019

Whether you use it for keeping track of work contacts, friends and family, or both, your iPhone's address book — called Contacts — can fill up fast. From time to time, you'll want to delete contacts that you no longer need from your iPhone. When the time comes to do that, deleting just one or two contacts on the phone is easy; there are a couple of ways to do it. Trying to delete multiple contacts at the same time, though, is a tougher task.

Current versions of iOS place the phone's Contacts inside the Phone app. Older versions of iOS place the contacts in a separate Contacts app outside the Phone app. After you open Contacts, the process to remove a contact is the same in either location.

How to Delete a Single Contact on an iPhone

When you have a single contact you want to delete from your iPhone, follow this process.

  1. Tap the Phone app to open it.

  2. Tap the Contacts icon at the bottom of the Phone screen.

    Phone icon, Contacts button on iOS

  3. Find the contact you want to delete. You can do this by browsing your contacts or searching using the bar at the top.

  4. When you locate the contact to delete, tap the name.

  5. When viewing the contact's screen, tap Edit.

  6. Scroll to the bottom of the screen and tap Delete Contact.

    Contact, Edit button, Delete Contact button on iOS

  7. If you change your mind and want to keep the contact, tap Cancel. Otherwise, to finalize the deletion, tap Delete Contact.

How to Delete a Single Contact in iCloud

Your iPhone may not be the only place you store your contacts. If you use iCloud and have it set to sync your contacts to other iCloud-compatible devices, your entire address book also lives in the cloud. So, if you prefer to delete contacts from iCloud directly, rather than on your iPhone, you can. Just follow these steps:

Deleting a contact in iCloud deletes it from all the Apple devices you've set up to sync contacts with your iCloud account. This is true whether you delete the contact from iCloud or on your iPhone. It's an easy way to make sure the contacts on all your devices are the same.

  1. In a web browser, go to iCloud.com.

  2. Log into iCloud using your Apple ID.

    Logging into iCloud on a computer

  3. From the main iCloud screen, click Contacts.

    Contacts icon on iCloud web page

  4. Find the contact you want to delete by browsing or searching.

  5. Click on the contact you want to delete.

    You can use iCloud to delete multiple contacts at the same time. To do that, hold down the Command key on a Mac (or the Control key on a PC if you use iCloud for Windows) and click all the contacts you want to delete. Then press the Delete key on the keyboard and Delete in the pop-up window.

  6. Click Edit.

    Edit button in Contacts for iCloud

  7. Select Delete Contact.

    Delete Contact button on iCloud web page

  8. In the pop-up window, click Cancel to keep the contact or Delete to get rid of it for good.

How to Delete Multiple Contacts on iPhone

Although you can delete multiple contacts at the same time using iCloud, there's no way to delete multiple contacts at the same time on the iPhone. However, some apps offer this feature. Solid options for deleting multiple contacts include: