Tips: trim your bloated contacts list with a custom sync group

phone. My phone has hundreds of contacts because Google auto-adds people I frequently email. That’s a great feature in Gmail, but its annoying on Android because I’m unlikely to call more than 20% of the people stored in my phone.

The simple fix for this problem is to create a special group of people to sync between Android and Google Contacts. This will give me much more control over who appears on my phone’s contacts.

WARNING: This method removes many contacts from syncing to the phone, which will affect the auto-complete feature in the Gmail application. Include people you frequently email if you want to auto-complete their address.

On Your Computer

1. Login to Gmail.com and click the “Contacts” tab. Then click the “Add Group” button that looks like this:
   
2. Label your new group “Android” or whatever term you choose to classify contacts.
3. Click on the “All Contacts” link to choose who will be included in your new group. Select as many people as you want by pressing the square radio button next to each person’s name.Tip: Clicking away from a name could erase all of the links that you post. I recommend adding people in groups of 10-20 to be safe.
4. Once your members are selected, click the “Groups” button and select “Android” to add them to that group.

On Your Android phone

This process may differ if your phone has a heavily-customized version of Android!

Android Contacts app

1. Open the “Contacts” app and press Menu> Edit Sync groups
2. Select “Android” or whatever name you assigned to your group
   
3. Press OK and you should be good to go.

Sony Ericsson Phones (XPERIA X10)

1. Press Menu > Settings > Data & Synchronization
2. Press Group Synchronization and then make sure that only “Android” is selected.
3. Press OK and you’ve now cut your contact list from 450 people to 105 relevant names you actually call or text.
4. Be sure to add new contact entries crated on the phone to the “Phone” contacts group to maintain two-way syncing.

HTC Hero

1. Open the “People” app and scroll to the right until you reach the Groups icon
   
   
2. Press Menu and select “Sync Groups”
3. Select “Android” and you’re phone will update to a more manageable list
4. 
   

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