Importing Google Contacts

[OAskarov]

Hello community,

Here's a question...

I have a customer managing a small business. They synced their personal Google contacts account with HubSpot.

Now, this created a mass in HubSpot because many contacts without an email address were synced. I'm trying to solve this.

For some of the contacts, we already updated their email addresses using information from other lists my customer provided. Others still appear just with a phone number.

Here comes the questions:

Is there a way to sync contacts from Google (for contacts without email addresses) into HubSpot without duplicates?
If not, what would be the best way to run this sync? 

The only thing that comes to my mind is exporting to Excel, running the whole logic, cleaning, and merging them. And then import it again to HubSpot.

Thank you in advance for your help.

[BérangèreL · Accepted solution]

Hi @OAskarov and thanks for getting back to us!

You’re correct: exporting, cleaning, and re-importing via Excel is the lowest-risk and simplest approach for small teams and contact lists.

Here is a similar thread "I synchronized my google contacts with crm Hubspot and now many middle names are put as the f..." where the solution from @danmoyle might help you!

And here are some resources that you might be interested in:

- Set up import files
- Import records and activities
- Deduplicate records in HubSpot

I hope this helps!

Have a wonderful weekend!
Bérangère

[danmoyle · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the tag @BérangèreL - this is exactly how I'd think about the question from @OAskarov with the spreadsheet & email addresses. Known emails should not create duplicates. Empty email address fields will. That's the nuts & bolts of how HubSpot is built. 

[RubenBurdin · Accepted solution]

Hi @OAskarov ,

You’ve already diagnosed the core issue correctly. The short answer is: no, there’s no way to sync Google Contacts into HubSpot without duplicates if those contacts don’t have an email address. That’s not a Google limitation, it’s fundamental to how HubSpot works.

HubSpot’s contact identity is email-based. If a contact comes in without an email, HubSpot has no reliable way to know whether it’s the same person as another record that only has a phone number. As a result, any sync or import that includes contacts with empty email fields will almost always create new records. That behavior hasn’t changed and still holds true today.

Because of that, there are really only two safe patterns:

First, stop the Google Contacts sync entirely, clean the data offline, then re-import. Export all contacts, enrich or complete email addresses where possible, remove records that you don’t actually want in HubSpot, and then import using email as the unique identifier. This is the lowest-risk option and the one HubSpot themselves usually recommend.

Second, if phone-only contacts are genuinely important, keep them out of HubSpot until they have an email. HubSpot isn’t designed to function as a phone-first contact database, and forcing that use case almost always leads to clutter and cleanup work later.

One small mitigation you can apply going forward is to limit Google Contacts sync to only contacts that already have an email address, if the account setup allows that. It won’t fix what’s already in HubSpot, but it prevents the mess from growing.

Unfortunately there’s no magic dedupe rule or workflow that can solve this automatically. Your Excel cleanup approach is boring, but it’s still the most reliable way to restore order.

Hope that confirms you’re not missing a hidden setting.

[OAskarov]

Thank you all for your answers.

[BérangèreL]

Hi @OAskarov, I hope that you are well!

Thanks for reaching out to the HubSpot Community!

I'd like to share this article "Connect HubSpot and Google Contacts" that might help!

Now, let's consult our Top Experts: Hi @danmoyle, @SamCBarth_LAIRE and @Shadab_Khan do you have suggestions to help @OAskarov, please?

Thanks so much for your help and have a lovely day! ☃️
Bérangère

[OAskarov]

Hello @BérangèreL ,

Thank you for that.

I am aware of this knowledge base page.

I already did this, I'm trying to prevent creating duplicates.

Thank you anyway.

Oren

[BérangèreL · Accepted solution]

Hi @OAskarov and thanks for getting back to us!

You’re correct: exporting, cleaning, and re-importing via Excel is the lowest-risk and simplest approach for small teams and contact lists.

Here is a similar thread "I synchronized my google contacts with crm Hubspot and now many middle names are put as the f..." where the solution from @danmoyle might help you!

And here are some resources that you might be interested in:

- Set up import files
- Import records and activities
- Deduplicate records in HubSpot

I hope this helps!

Have a wonderful weekend!
Bérangère

[danmoyle · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the tag @BérangèreL - this is exactly how I'd think about the question from @OAskarov with the spreadsheet & email addresses. Known emails should not create duplicates. Empty email address fields will. That's the nuts & bolts of how HubSpot is built.