Why I cannot delete contacts from my Samsung Phone


Question

Recently I realized that I have a hard time adding contacts to my samsung phone.


So I want to delete contacts. I remove google account with contacts. Turns out the contacts are still there.


4400 of them


Even though contacts in my google account is only 2200.


So I want to delete all contacts in my android and then resync it with google.


I can't delete contacts at all.


Not even if I delete the whole thing. Not if I do it one by one.


enter image description here


This is the screenshot. The progress bar just stay there.


Do nothing like an idiot.


I am thinking or factory resetting but that's probably overkill.


I've heard many people have same problems.


What's the problem.


I have no idea what can possibly be wrong. Where are all those contacts stored anyway? SIM? Samsung account? Google account, which I have removed?


Where? Why I have a hard time to add or delete contacts?


Answer

If a contact is stored on your SIM card can be determined easily: SIM card contacts only how two fields: one for the name, the other for the phone number. If a contact has more data it can not be a SIM card contact. You can also check that easily by removing the SIM card and rebooting the device.


Regular contacts are stored in one or more databases that belong to the device's contacts provider app com.android.providers.contacts. Therefore you find the contact data in the directory /data/data/com.android.providers.contacts (only accessible with root permissions).


You you have removed all online accounts your device can sync accounts to the account data is only available locally. For deleting every contact you may simply clear the app data of the contact provider com.android.providers.contacts. It is a system app therefore make sure to enable the "Show system apps" option in Android settings to see this app.


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