ABCDP File

What are ABCDP files and how to open them

Are you having problems opening an ABCDP file or are you simply curious about its contents? We're here to explain the properties of these files and provide you with software that can open or handle your ABCDP files.

What is an ABCDP file?

An .ABCDP file is an Address Book CoreData Person file.

Address Book CoreData Person files store individual contact (person) records from Apple's macOS Contacts system. These files appear under user folders such as ~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/Metadata/ or under Sources/<UUID>/Metadata/. Each .ABCDP holds data for exactly one person. If the main Contacts database file (AddressBook-v22.abcddb) is lost or corrupt, the system can rebuild most contacts by reading all the .ABCDP files.

Each .ABCDP file is a property list (plist) format, typically stored in binary form. It includes name fields (first, last, nickname, suffix), email addresses, phone numbers, organization, job title, department, phonetic name components, creation and modification timestamps, and identifiers for related services (like jabber, Yahoo, ICQ, MSN, etc.). They support custom and multi-valued properties. These files are used by Contacts.app to combine metadata and to sync data, but not all contacts in the database always have corresponding .ABCDP files.

In binary form these plist files begin with the ASCII signature bplist00, and inside contain keys such as IDENTIFIERSVLABELS, ABPROPERTYTYPES, FIRSTPHONETIC, LASTPHONETIC, ORGANIZATION, XYAHOOINSTANT, XBIRTHDAY, UEMAIL, UPHONE, TLAST, and TURLS.

How to open ABCDP files

Important: Different programs may use files with the ABCDP file extension for different purposes, so unless you are sure which format your ABCDP file is, you may need to try a few different programs.

We have not yet verified any programs for Windows that work with this specific file format. If you know one, please use the 'Suggest a program' link below. Thanks!

Last updated: August 16, 2026

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