All contacts have changed to "custom"

[user9KwkDWDHky]

March 28, 3025 noticed all names of over 1000 of my contacts changed to "custom." Have most recent update on my S24+. Use Gmail app with 2 accounts - Gmail and Comcast email. Sent report thru samsung members app. Any wisdom?

[realaud]

Where are you storing your contacts?  Samsung account? Google contacts? SIM card? phone? Try clearing the phone's cache and see if it comes back to normal.  Also clear the cache of the contacts app. If you are storing your contacts in multiple places, you should move them to one place.  You contacts should be being synced to Google Contacts, even if they are in another storage location.  Open a browser and go to contacts.google.com and see if they are listed there.  Go to your contacts app (not the contacts tab of the phone dialer) and open the side menu (3 bars on left).  Tap on "All contacts" and see where your contacts are stored.  If they are all over the place, choose manage contacts and select move contacts (select the from and to locations).  I suggest you move them all into Google so that you can access and edit them from anywhere. I suggest you don't do this, however, until you sort out the naming.  Make sure Google Contacts sync is on (settings/google/all services), so that when you add a contact from your phone or website they will be synced. After you do any/all of this return to the contacts app and tap on "all contacts" and select the default contact location (if you moved your contacts to Google, that will be the place the phone will automatically store new contacts).

[user9KwkDWDHky]

Appreciated multiple hep suggestions. Most didnt solve problem. Last option to do system default reset reluctant to try. All contacts saved on Google acct have the "custom" problem. Not sure rusking lose other app info and maybe end up with same problem. Noticed by comments that this was an issue in 2023, 2024, and now 2025. In past when aggravated at problem that occurred after an update, waiting until future updates sometimes fixed problem. Wish I could restore phone to before last update to test this theory.

[realaud]

Well, the only other thing to do is go through your numbers one by one, as I suggested and change the designations on the phone numbers.  As I said, the easiest, least bothersome way, would be to change the contacts you use most first and then go to the rest of them when you have nothing better to do.  In the 15 phones I have had over the course of my use of smart phones, I have always kept my contacts in Google exclusively and never had any designations change from what I set them to. Perhaps it's a quirk of being stored on the phone itself.  

[user9KwkDWDHky]

Tx a bunch. Will take some time but at least o have some things to try. Turned your message into sort of a checklist to keep me organized.

[DeltaBravo94]

That's a neat trick. Your post is 100 years and 1 week in the future.

[skibik]

Your still about 900 years off! It would be 1000 years in the future not 100.

[DeltaBravo94]

Yep that's last zero fell off my reply.

[user9KwkDWDHky]

Below is link to my checklist of things did and discovered. Maybe you can figure out next step ? Tx
https://1drv.ms/w/c/7e930e7d767f43f1/EVL9sVu7ZLJHssFxlCBFey0BvX3biVPpvo2nUAzSEyBENQ?e=27MKLy

[realaud]

Something got messed up.  Just so I am clear, are you saying all the *names* got set to "custom"? So all your contacts have the same name, "custom"?  I don't even know how that would be possible. At the very least, since the name field has to be manually filled, a glitch should revert it to blank.  

I suggest you do copy the contacts to Google to make sure they are backed up, even as they are, and then bite the bullet and do a factory reset of the phone and restore your backup.  Hopefully, whatever glitch caused this problem will reverse itself with the reset and hopefully your contacts come back.  

Also, FYI, since Gmail is a Google service, any contacts you have in Google will appear in your Gmail app and any contacts you add in Gmail will populate into Google contacts.  You don't have to actually use your Gmail account for this to be true, as you must have a Gmail account to use an Android phone. This is why your contacts automatically sync with Google, no matter where they are actually saved.