A domain/boundary decomposition technique is applied to carry out efficient finite element analyses of 3-D contact problems. Appropriate penalty functions are selected for connecting an interface and contact interfaces with neighboring subdomains that satisfy continuity constraints. As a consequence, all the effective stiffness matrices have positive definiteness, and computational efficiency can be improved to a considerable degree. If necessary, any complex-shaped 3-D domain can be divided into several simple-shaped subdomains without considering the conformity of meshes along the interface. With a set of numerical examples, the basic characteristics of computational efficiency are investigated carefully.