Outlook contacts not syncing with Teams, why?

[Kai Stenberg]

Hi, according to this : https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-teams/o365-outlook-contacts-not-syncing-with-teams/...

You need to have a company name for every contact you want to sync to Teams. 

Why does it have to be like this. I have and lot's my customers do not understand this. In Skype for business this was so much better.

Why do I need to add a company name for eg. my parents, my friends if I want to call them. This is pointless and I think this needs to be fixed.

As from my point of view this is a major issue and a real bad feature for this kind of function.

[#2]

@Kai Stenberg Hello, if you want the contacts to show up in Teams (under Calls -> Contacts) they will when they have been assigned a phone number. Just added a contact in Outlook to verify, it didn't populate in Teams until I added a number to the contact.

Just to be clear. I did only add the name, email and phone in the above scenario. A manual sign out / sign with the Teams client quickened the contact appearing in Teams.

[#3]

@ChristianBergstrom but if I have already lot's of contacts in outlook, who does not appear until I add a company name in outlook eg. Private or the real company name

[#4]

@Kai Stenberg That's a fair question. I suppose our environments aren't identical. The Outlook contacts you're adding a company name to already have a phone number? Do you have any contact that's missing a phone number you could test and add a number to? Or just reproduce the scenario I described earlier. It would be interesting to know the outcome.

[#5]

A contact that I have in outlook who has a phonenumber and email address but no company name does not appear in Teams under contacts in calls. If I ad in Teams under contacts it does not appear in Outlook.
If would have been nice to have they both synced. :)
So as I see it, if you have outlook contacts with phonenumber and email address, without company they don't get synced into Teams contacts :(

[#6 · Accepted solution]

@Kai Stenberg Please try adding a contact in Outlook with just a name and a phone number. Sign out of Teams desktop manually (top right corner) and back in again. Does it appear under Calls -> Contacts in Teams?

[#7]

Hi @ChristianBergstrom, this was interesting. Added a new contact without email address just company name and phonenumber on E164 standard. Did a restart and it was added.

But old contacs does not show up for some reason if I don't add a company name. Real strange.

[#8]

Hi again @ChristianBergstrom I think I have a conclusion. 

Just add a new contact or update an old one and restart Teams and it will show up.

Thanks for pushing me testing different way to figure this out. 

Problem solved for now I think. Have a great day and stay safe.

[#9]

@Kai Stenberg I had a feeling that was the issue. Good to hear and glad to help!

[#10]

@Kai Stenberg Should new outlook contacts continue to sync after I sign out once or am I going to have to sign out and in everytime I add a contact? We are also experiencing a lot of issues where signing out and in does not resolve the sync issue. 

[#11]

Hi again, new issues regarding to contacts. 

When under calls--> Contacts and searching, it seems to just find the one you have in your list. But if you choose to add a new then it search the whole global address list from what I see.

Why not just do that from "find" functions and why does it still not import the whole list from you local GAL? This is still strange.

[#12]

Hi, you do not have to sign out / sign in manually it just quickens the appearance of the contact in Teams. There are a couple of things to take into consideration though, such as environment (cloud/on-prem, coexistence/upgrade mode in Teams) as the behavior will differ. Access Outlook contacts is not supported with mailboxes on premise, for example (see table).

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/exchange-teams-interact

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/upgrade-to-teams-on-prem-coexistence#contacts

I am aware of several UserVoice requests for an enhanced way to manage and sync Outlook contacts with Teams.

[#13]

It is not solved for me. I have old contacts in Outlook with Company Name and Phone Number and they do not sync. I can create a new contact with the same name, no company and a phone number and the contacts syncs to Teams. If a user has hundreds of old contacts they do not sync to Teams.

[#14]

@elliottchandler 

For all who will listen, after a 6 month long case with 365 support I finally have a fix to the Outlook/Teams contact sync problem!!! you have to put Teams into 'Public Preview' mode.

First follow link below to make the option available on the teams app:

 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/public-preview-doc-updates

Wait a bit for the policy to propagate to the clients then turn the setting on in the app 

Close teams and reopen. Then BOOM!!

[#15]

@elliottchandler 

For all who will listen, after a 6 month long case with 365 support I finally have a fix to the Outlook/Teams contact sync problem!!! you have to put Teams into 'Public Preview' mode.

First follow link below to make the option available on the teams app:

 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/public-preview-doc-updates

Wait a bit for the policy to propagate to the clients then turn the setting on in the app 

Close teams and reopen. Then BOOM!! ALL contacts will start to load

[#16]

@pbarnett  do you have also a solution for subfolder contacts? this solution works only for main level contacts.

[#17]

Import Your Contacts Again

Make sure your Outlook address book is properly synched with Teams. One reason why Teams can't find your contacts is that Outlook contacts failed to sync or import to Teams. Launch Outlook and select the address book. Then click the first contact and then select all contacts.

Hope This Works,
Peter