VCF file imports only one contact – or not all of them

Outlook (classic): only the first contact

Opening or importing a multi-contact .vcf in Outlook adds only the first vCard. Outlook's bulk route is CSV: convert the VCF to an Outlook-format CSV, then File › Open & Export › Import/Export › Import from another program or file › Comma Separated Values. Cardmend exports Outlook's own CSV column layout.

Alternatively split the VCF into one file per contact and drag them into Outlook's contacts folder – workable for small numbers.

iCloud: “could not import some contacts”

• vCard 2.1 from old phones (quoted-printable, CHARSET parameters) is handled less well than vCard 3.0. Convert to 3.0.
• Very large embedded photos can make entries fail; re-export with smaller or no photos.
• Broken lines (an unescaped line break in a note) corrupt the following entries.

Android / Google: some contacts missing

• Contacts without a name but only a number may be merged or shown differently.
• Duplicates are linked automatically, so the count can be lower than the file's.
• Check the file's real count before importing – Cardmend shows it, with any parsing warnings.

Clean the file first

Open the VCF in Cardmend, review warnings, merge duplicates, normalise phone numbers, then export vCard 3.0 (best supported by iCloud and Google) or the CSV the target needs. Split into smaller files if a service times out.