Can't edit contact details in Outlook Live

I've had exactly the same problem too - for some time. For me, one of the email fields - for some of the contacts - would be grayed out and could not be changed. The easiest way to solve it was to delete that contact and then re-enter it - and this is obviously too slow when you have lots of contacts to deal with.

Today, I noticed also that these same contacts were not syncing with Windows 10 Mail. I could see them online at outlook.com, but could not view them in the Windows 10 People app, or easily use their details when writing emails.

But... I think I've worked out the problem, and how to solve it. :)

I previously used Outlook (the desktop application, part of the MS Office suite) to categorise my contacts. (Not lists, categories.) When I looked closer at the contacts on outlook.com, all of these categories had been put into separate contact folders, many of them inside an 'Other Contacts' folder. You can view these other folders of contacts by clicking on the ^ icon next to 'Your Contacts' in the left hand column.

To solve the problem, you need to move the contacts from these folders into the main contacts folder. Amazingly I could not find any way to drag and drop the contacts or folder around. So what I did in the end was:

1. Moved these contacts folders out of 'Other Contacts'.
2. Exported contacts from each folder to a CSV file.
3. Click on Contacts and import the CSV file to add the contacts into the main contacts folder.
4. Delete the old folder (and its contents) to get rid of the old contacts that don't work properly.

Everything now seems to work as it should - online at outlook.com and using Windows 10 Mail and People!

The only question I have now is why MS provided a folder function, but no easy way to move contacts into and out of folders.

Hope this helps you as well.

I just saw the phrase "Update to Premium" at the bottom of the folders column.

MICROSOFT want us to pay for a system that works.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$  greed - hotmail used to be free and we are trapped with all our contacts in hotmail and all our friends know our hotmail address.

It must be time to migrate to gmail.

I see what you mean, and maybe that is the source of the bug - but the bug is still there and it is disgraceful that microsoft is not

doing anything about it. And they then have the nerve to try and sell us their premium version.

I agree with you that it is time to move to gmail - as many of my friends are doing. I have been too lazy to do it so far, and

I think Microsoft depend on people being lazy. Unacceptable attitude imho for a large company.

Totally agree with everything you say.

that won't resolve my issue. I don't have the 'other contacts' folder you spoke of. plus when I tried importing, it didn't give me an option to import from where i'd saved the file. :(  but thanks for trying!

it looks to me like the only options are:

• recreate all contacts that have this issue
• move to gmail

neither are satisfactory for the many reasons that folk above have stated.

• the amount of work to recreate contacts
• everyone has my hotmail address; AND i don't really like gmail for email. they keep changing things, too, which just confuses me. i have a gmail account that i haven't used for a number of years now.