How do I open a .vcf file on a computer?

Double-click it to import into Contacts on macOS or the People app on Windows. To read it without importing, open it in any text editor, because vCard is plain text with one labelled field per line.

How do I import a .vcf with many contacts?

Import it into Google Contacts or Thunderbird, both of which read every VCARD block in the file. Some other applications stop after the first contact and silently ignore the rest.

File extensions

How to open a .vcf file

vCard contact file · Contacts

A .vcf file holds one or more contacts as plain text. Double-clicking imports it into your address book; opening it in a text editor shows the raw details immediately.

What a .vcf file actually is

vCard is the standard format for exchanging contact details, defined in RFC 6350. Each entry is readable text with lines such as FN for full name and TEL for phone number, so nothing is hidden.

A single .vcf can contain one contact or thousands, which is what makes it the usual vehicle for moving an entire address book between phones and mail clients.

Why it will not open

It usually opens but goes somewhere you did not intend, importing into whichever contacts application claimed the file type. And a .vcf exported from one platform can import with missing fields on another, because vendors extend the format.

Step by step

Windows

01Double-click to import into the Windows People app.
02To see the contents without importing anything, right-click, choose "Open with", then Notepad. Every field is readable text.
03To import into Outlook, use File, Open & Export, then Import/Export.
04For a file with many contacts, some importers only take the first one. Splitting it or importing through Google Contacts, which handles multi-contact files properly, avoids that.

macOS

01Double-click to import into Contacts.
02To preview first, right-click, choose Open With, then TextEdit.
03In Contacts you can also use File, Import and select the file explicitly.

What usually goes wrong

Only the first contact imported

Some applications stop at the first VCARD block in a multi-contact file. Importing through Google Contacts or Thunderbird handles the whole file, and you can then sync from there.

Programs that open .vcf

Our pick, in order. Every one links to the publisher's official download URL and the SHA-256 hash of the installer, so you can check the file before you run it.

Common questions

How do I open a .vcf file on a computer?: Double-click it to import into Contacts on macOS or the People app on Windows. To read it without importing, open it in any text editor, because vCard is plain text with one labelled field per line.
How do I import a .vcf with many contacts?: Import it into Google Contacts or Thunderbird, both of which read every VCARD block in the file. Some other applications stop after the first contact and silently ignore the rest.