Complete Guide to Extract Contacts from OST File

Throughout this article, we share the top two techniques to extract contacts from OST file. We will share a manual technique as well as an automated solution backed by countless technical experts. So, to find out which solution is a better fit for you, read this entire article thoroughly.

OST files are a synchronized copy of your Outlook mailbox and are one of the proprietary formats of MS Outlook as well. They contain all the items of the mailbox, for instance, emails, calendars, contacts, etc. Sometimes, users get in a situation where they need to extract items from their OST files, however, they are not aware of the procedure. Therefore, we have brought you the best solutions from all over the internet. Let us start and dive right into the article.

Why Extracting Contacts from OST is Significant?

There are numerous reasons why it becomes significant to extract contacts from OST; here we have listed the most common reasons for that.

• Extracting and exporting contacts from OST files saves users from suffering accidental data corruption or loss.
• Upon extracting and backing up contacts, you can also delete them to free up storage space from OST file.
• If unfortunately, your OST file gets orphaned, then the best way to save lost contacts is to retrieve them by extraction.
• Since an OST file is not a sharable format, extracting and saving OST items such as contacts is the best way to share them.

So this is an expert recommended solution on accomplishing the task. Further in the article, we have shared the manual solution as well. To know both solutions in detail, check out the following segments.

Manually Retrieve Contacts from Outlook OST

• Open MS Outlook on your system and head to the File tab.
• Click on Open & Export >> Import/Export Wizard. Doing so, the Import/Export Wizard will open.
• Select the “Export to a File” option and click Next.
• In the Export dialogue box that appears, select “Comma Separated Values” from the list and click Next.
• Then, choose the Contact Folder in the Select the folder to export from an option. Click Next.
• Click Browse to set the location for the resultant files.
• Enable the checkbox for the “Export Contacts from Folder” option and at last, click Finish.

This is how you can manually extract contacts from OST file. Follow the given step carefully and with caution to ensure saving your extracted contacts at the set location. Unfortunately, this manual method comes with some limitations.

All these hindrances make the method an undesirable choice for users. And therefore, technical experts suggest an automated solution that guarantees security and reliability to user OST data.

Detailed Steps to Extract Contacts from Outlook OST File

• Install and launch the software on your system. Upon starting, click on the “Open” button in the top-left corner.
  
• Now, from the appeared dropdown menu, select Email Data Files >> OST files >> Choose File or Choose Folder to add your OST files to the software.
  
• Now, click on the “Extract” tab and select “Phone Numbers” from the dropdown list.
  
• Use the provided advanced options and hit the Save button.
  

And that is all for the hassle-free tutorial on how to extract contacts from OST file with an expert recommended tool. Furthermore, this tool provides several advanced features that make it a rare find these days.

So There You Have It

In this article, we discussed how you can extract contacts from OST file. To accomplish the task, we shared two methods with you; one manual and the other automated. Unfortunately, there are several limitations attached to the manual method, thus, technical experts recommend users go for the above-mentioned professional solution to ensure smooth and reliable results.