iphone contacts disappeared!

all my iphone contacts disappeared after I synced last time. this has never happened before. wtf?!

they are all still on my desktop in my outlook contacts, but no matter how I try to sync and sync, I cannot get them back on my iphone. WTF has happened?

Have you checked to make sure that you have the correct contact GROUPS selected? Go to Contacts (via the phone or contacts apps) and tap Groups in the upper left corner. Select Show All Contacts and see if that is the problem.

If you have them in outlook, they may be assigned to a specific email address. Therefore, you could setup that email on the device(Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > add account) and choose to sync contacts OTA(over the air). You would, however, need to know the mail server settings to be able to complete this.

Re "tap groups in the upper left corner" ?? There is no such button. if I go to the phone or the contacts app, there is nothing in the upper left corner that says "groups" ??

the top already says "all contacts" so I dont think there are any "groups.
but why did this happen at all, just randomly? it's never happened before. I used to sync all the time and all my contacts would sync over from my computer to my phone. Ive been doing it for years. what changed?

Next to "All Contacts" there should be a button that says "Groups."

I'd make sure you have the correct box checked in iTunes. Maybe you didn't realize it.

When you sync with the pc you have to chose a way to store the contacts. So every time you do a os reinstall you get your contacts back. Maybe the contacts on your pc got erased and it had nothing to sync. Or you chose a different way to sync contacts or sync'd from another pc.