How to Recover Deleted iPhone Contacts Without Backup

Is there any way to recover contacts from iPhone 4 itself?

I accidentally deleted several contacts from my iPhone 4, and forget to back them up with iTunes. Now I need them urgently, but I've heard that there is no way to recover deleted data on an iPhone except through backup. Is that really? Can I recover data from iPhone itself without iTunes backup? Please help! Thanks in advance.

The saying that there is no way to recover iPhone data without iTunes backup is absolutely wrong. Due to the special technology of iOS devices, it's very hard recover data directly from iPhone itself, but it's not impossible. There is indeed such a program that enables you to recover contacts from iPhone 5/4S/4/3GS without iTunes backup files: Wondershare Dr.Fone for Windows users or Wondershare Dr.Fone (Mac) for Mac users.

Download the free trial version below to have a try. For Windows users, please get the right one for your own device.

Note: If you've synced your iPhone with iTunes on your PC or Mac before losing your contacts, you also can recover your previous contacts by extracting the iTunes backup.

Steps of how to recover iPhone contacts without backup

The tutorial below is about the Windows version of Wondershare Dr.Fone. If you are a Mac user, please read the guide of Wondershare Dr.Fone (Mac) here: Wondershare Dr.Fone (Mac) User Guide.

Before recovering deleted iPhone contacts, you need to know one thing that don't use your iPhone for anything after you lost your contacts, because any operation on your iPhone may overwrite the lost data. The best way is to power off your iPhone until you've recovered lost iPhone contacts.

Now follow next steps to recover deleted iPhone contacts without iTunes backup files.

Step 1. Connect iPhone to your computer

First of all, connect your iPhone to your computer, then run Wondershare Dr.Fone, and you'll get the interface below. Here are 2 recovery modes provided: Recover from iDevice and Recover from iTunes Backup File. Just stay at the default one.

Step 2. Enter the iPhone's system and scan it for deleted contacts

To recover deleted contacts directly from iPhone, you need to enter its system before scan. Follow steps below:

1. Hold your iPhone and click “Start” button.
2. Press “Power” and “Home” buttons on your iPhone at the same time for exact 10 seconds. The software will count time for you.
3. When 10 seconds passed, release the “Power” button right away, but keep holding the “Home” button. After another 10 seconds, you’ll be informed that you’ve successfully entered the system and you can release the “Home” button now.

After that, the program start to scan your iPhone for the deleted contacts automatically, and the interface is showed like below.

Step 3. Preview & recover deleted iPhone contacts

After the scan, you can preview all data that have been found by Wondershare Dr.Fone. Choose "Contacts" on the left side and you can preview all your deleted contacts here as follow, including job titles, addresses, and more.

Note: Data found here includes those contacts you have on your iPhone now. If you only want to retrieve deleted contacts from your iPhone, slide the button in the red area at the bottom (Only display the deleted items). Then mark and recover them.

Moreover, you can import recovered contacts back to your iPhone, you can use Wondershare MobileGo for iOS, which allows you to import and export iPhone contacts freely.