When you’re using Gmail, there will likely come a time when you want to create a new contact. But if you’re using the Gmail web interface, it’s actually not super obvious how you would do that.
But don’t worry, it is actually fairly easy to create new contacts in Gmail, and in this article, I’m going to show you how it’s done.
Prefer to watch a video about how to add contacts in Gmail? Click here.
How To Create A Contact In Gmail
The reason there’s no obvious button to create a new contact in Gmail is that Gmail actually uses contacts from Google Contacts. So you’ll actually need to create a new contact in Google Contacts, and then it will appear in Gmail.
From Gmail, the easiest way to get to Google Contacts is to click on the contacts icon in the menu on the right hand side of the screen…
And then a box will appear on the right hand side of the screen listing out all your existing contacts.
Unfortunately, there is no button in this menu to actually create a new contact, but you can open the propper Google Contacts website in a new tab by clicking the arrow button in the top right hand corner.
Now, you will be in Google contacts, and from here, all you need to do is click the “Create contact” button in the top left hand corner…
And then, in the menu that appears, click “Create a contact”.
Now, all you have to do is enter all the details of your contact.
All you really need to enter is their name and email address, but there are heaps of other fields you can fill in if you want like their company, job title, phone number, birthday, and more. You can even add a photo of them by clicking the camera icon if you really want to.
But to keep things simple, I’m just going to stick with the name and email address.
Then, once you’ve filled in all the relevant details, just go ahead and click the “Save” button near the top right hand corner to save your new contact.
Now, your contact will be saved and you’ll be taken to a page that shows you your new contact, and you can click the back arrow to go back and see all your contacts.
And that’s all there is to it! While you’re here, you can create another contact if you like, but if you only wanted to create one new contact, you can now close the tab Google Contacts was in and go back to Gmail.
Now, if you compose a new email and start typing your new contact’s name or email address in the “To” field, it will pop up just like all your other contacts.
And if your contact sends you an email, you will see the name you entered for them, their picture (if you added one), and other details like that.
How To Create A Contact For Someone Who Sent You An Email
If you’re happy to manually enter all your contacts’ details, you can follow the steps above and that will work just fine. But, if someone has sent you an email, you can actually add them to your contacts in just a few clicks without having to type in any of their details.
To do that, just open up an email you’ve received from them in the past, and then hover your mouse over their profile picture (or the generic grey icon where their profile picture would be if they don’t have one).
After about a second of hovering, a little card will appear next to their profile picture with their name and email address. And if you click the “person with a plus icon” in the top right hand corner of the card, they will automatically be added to your contacts!
And that’s really all there is to it! But, if you want to all a few more details than just their name and email address, you can click the pencil icon that has now taken the place of the “person with a plus icon”…
And then it will open up the newly created contact in Google contacts, and you’ll be able to add any details you like.
And that’s all there is to it! You now know two different ways to create contacts in Gmail.
