How to transfer contacts from iPhone to Xiaomi via Bluetooth: a complete guide with life hacks

Why Bluetooth is not always the best choice for mobile

Shifting contacts between smartphones across ecosystems — iOS and Android — often becomes a headache. Xiaomi users are faced with the fact that standard methods of syncing through iCloud or Google Account require a lot of action, and the Lightning-USB-C cable is not always at hand. In this situation, Bluetooth seems to be a simple solution: no wires, no need to connect to the Internet. But in practice, this method is fraught with pitfalls.

The main problem is the limitations of the Bluetooth protocol on the iPhone. Apple artificially narrows the functionality of wireless data transfer between its devices and “foreign” platforms. For example, you can not send the entire phone book at once — only one contact at a time. This makes the process extremely laborious if you have hundreds of records.

However, if you only need to move 10 to 15 contacts, or you are in a restricted Internet environment, Bluetooth remains a workable option. In this article, we will explore not only the transfer process itself, but also alternative ways that will save you time, and you will learn how to avoid the typical mistakes that cause contacts to lose photos or groupings.

Preparation of devices: what to do before transfer

Before you start the transfer, make sure that both smartphones are ready to exchange data. On your iPhone, check the following settings:

• 🔄 iOS Update: Go to Settings → Mainstream → Update: Outdated versions (below iOS 14) may not support Bluetooth contact transfers.
• 📱 Bluetooth Visibility: Activate Detection Mode in Settings → Bluetooth. On Xiaomi, turn on Device Search in the same menu.
• 🔒 Contact permissions: open Settings → Confidentiality → Contact and make sure that access to the phone book is allowed for system applications.
• 📶 Flight mode: Turn it off on both devices – it blocks Bluetooth communication.

On a Xiaomi smartphone (for example, Redmi Note 12 or POCO X5) additionally:

• 🧹 Cache Clearing: Go to Settings → Annexes → Application management → Contacts → Warehouse → Clean the cache. This will prevent disruptions when importing.
• 📂 Default Memory: If you have a memory card installed, check that contacts are stored in internal memory (Settings) → Memory. → Default location).

⚠️ Note: If the iPhone is enabled with Limitation (in Settings) → Screen time. → Content restrictions, Bluetooth contact transfer will be blocked.

Step-by-step: Transfer of contacts via Bluetooth

Now, to the process itself, it's important to follow the instructions consistently to avoid data loss or duplication of records.

1. On Xiaomi, turn on Bluetooth and click Device Search. On your iPhone in the Bluetooth menu, select the name of your Xiaomi smartphone from the list. Confirm pairing on both devices (confirmation code must match).
2. Open the Contacts app on iPhone, select the entry you want and click Share Contact. From the list of options, select Bluetooth (if not available, update iOS or use an alternative method).
3. On the Xiaomi smartphone, a notification of the incoming file (.vcf format) will appear. Accept it and select Save to Contacts. Repeat the action for each contact.

If you need to move a few contacts, the process can be optimized a little:

• 📋 Group Submitting: On iPhone, select multiple contacts (click Select in the upper right corner), then Share → Bluetooth.
• 🔄 Automatic save: on Xiaomi in Bluetooth settings, enable Automatic file reception (available on the MIUI 13+).

⚠️ Note: When transmitting contacts with Cyrillic names via Bluetooth to Xiaomi, the encoding may be lost. To avoid this, change the system language to English on your iPhone before sending it (Settings) → Mainstream → Language and region, then return Russian after transfer.

Common Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Even with the seemingly simple process, users often face problems, and here are the most common ones and ways to solve them:

Another common problem is the duplication of contacts on Xiaomi, which happens if you previously synced your phone book with a Google Account or Mi Account, to avoid chaos:

1. Before transferring, export your existing contacts to Xiaomi to.vcf (Contacts) → Settings → Exports).
2. After importing new contacts, use the “Unite duplicates” function in the Contacts app settings.

💡

If Xiaomi doesn’t display Bluetooth file reception, restart both devices and re-pair, often addressing the invisibility problem.

Alternative ways to transfer contacts (if Bluetooth does not work)

If Bluetooth transmission is too slow or impossible, consider alternative methods that require a little more effort, but ensure that all data, including photos and notes, is safe.

1. via iCloud and Google Account

This is the most reliable way, but it requires an Internet connection:

1. On iPhone go to Settings → [Your name] → iCloud and enable Contact Synchronization.
2. On your computer, open iCloud.com, log in and export contacts to the.vcf file.
3. Import this file to Google Contacts (contacts.google.com).
4. On Xiaomi, add the same Google Account to Settings → Accounts and enable contact synchronization.

2. Move to iOS app (new Xiaomi only)

If your Xiaomi is not set up yet (for example, after buying), use Apple’s official app:

• 📱 Install Move to iOS on iPhone from the App Store.
• 🔄 At the setup stage, select Data Transfer and follow the instructions.
• ⚡ The application will transfer not only contacts, but also photos, messages and even some settings.

⚠️ Note: Move to iOS only works when you first set up Xiaomi. If the smartphone is already in use, you will have to reset it to factory settings (Settings) → The phone. → Resetting settings) that will delete all data.

3. Through SIM-Card (for a small number of contacts)

If you're old. SIM-phonebook:

1. On iPhone, export your contacts to SIM In Settings → Contacts → Imports SIM-Contacts (not available on all models).
2. Insert SIM into Xiaomi and import contacts through Contacts → Settings → Import/Export → Import with SIM.

This method has serious limitations: SIM-The cards only store names and numbers (no email, addresses or photos) and support no more than 250 contacts.

How to transfer contacts with photos and additional fields

Bluetooth cannot transmit attachments (photos, company logos) and additional fields (dates of birth, addresses, notes).

1.Export/import via file.vcf

A.vcf file (vCard) saves all contact information, including photos, to transfer the data in full:

1. On iPhone, export contacts: Settings → [Your name] → iCloud → Contacts (include) → iCloud.com → Exports vCard
2. Send the file to Xiaomi via email, Telegram or cloud storage (Mi Cloud, Google Drive).
3. On Xiaomi, open the.vcf file and import contacts.

2. sync through Microsoft Outlook account

If you are using Outlook:

• 📧 Add Outlook account to iPhone in Settings → Passwords and accounts.
• 🔄 Turn on contact synchronization.
• 📱 On Xiaomi, add the same Outlook account to Settings → Accounts.

This method even keeps a history of contacts changes, but requires a stable Internet connection.

3. Transfer applications (e.g. My Contacts Backup)

In the App Store and Google Play there are specialized utilities:

• 📲 My Contacts Backup (iOS) → Creates a backup of contacts in the form of a file that can be sent to Xiaomi.
• 🤖 Contacts Optimizer (Android) → Restores contacts from backup, correcting duplicates and encoding errors.

💡

The.vcf file is the only format that stores all contact data (photos, addresses, notes) when migrating between iOS and Android. Bluetooth only transfers basic information (name). + number).

What to do if contacts are moved curved: fixing errors

After the transfer, you may find that the names appear as??????, the photos are missing, and the phone numbers are duplicated.

1. Correction of coding (crankies instead of names)

If you see symbols instead of Cyrillic names. Андрей, The problem is coding:

• 🔤 Manual editing: Open contact on Xiaomi and manually fix the name.
• 📁 Re-import: export contacts back to.vcf, open a file in a text editor (e.g. Notepad)++) and replace the encoding with UTF-8, Then import again.
• 🤖 Converter App: Use Contacts Fix & Export from Google Play to automatically fix encoding.

2. Removal of duplicates

If you have duplicated your contacts, use the built-in Xiaomi feature:

1. Open Contacts → Settings → Contact Management → Combine duplicates.
2. The app will automatically find the duplicate records and prompt them to be combined.

For advanced cleaning, use Simpler Merge (Android) – it finds duplicates even with different number formats (for example, it can be used for the same number formats, +79123456789 and 8(912)345-67-89).

3. Recovery of contact photos

If the photos are not transferred, try:

• 🖼️ Manual download: find original photos of contacts on iPhone (they are stored in Photos) → Albums. → People) and send them to Xiaomi via AirDrop or messenger.
• 🔍 Search on social networks: many contacts are linked to accounts in the VK, Facebook or Telegram – smartphone can automatically pull avatars from there.

⚠️ Note: If you have transferred your contact through SIM-You can't recover the map, you can't recover the photos, because this format doesn't support multimedia data, and then you just have to manually search for the images.

FAQ: Answers to Frequent Questions