How Do I Delete Duplicate Photos In Catalina?

Comments: 3 Responses to “How Do I Delete Duplicate Photos In Catalina?”

Gary Rosenzweig

5 years ago

First, are you sure they are duplicates? I ask because numerous times I've had people ask me about duplicates only to discover after some back-and-forth that they are just looking at the same photos but in different views (All Photos, various albums, etc).

If you really have duplicates, then before you do anything, try to figure out why. After all, it doesn't pay to remove them if the problem will just occur again.

Common reason include importing multiple times, turning off iCloud Photos and back on again (saving your photos locally so they merge back in as duplicates), importing view a cable and also over iCloud. Sometime people are using both Photo Stream and iCloud Photos, or Photo Stream and syncing, both of which import the photos.

So figure that out first.

Then just go into All Photos mode which will show the photos in chronological order. So any duplicates will be right next to each other. Then review the photos and delete one of each duplicate. If you have a lot, plan to do it over a series of short sessions.

There is no good way for doing this "automatically" as photos tend to be very important (they are for me) so I want to check each deletion myself. That is why it is critical to figure out why this is happening and make sure you can do this once and not have to do it again.

John Johnson

5 years ago

Do any of the flash drive gizmos (like PhotoStick) for saving photos and removing duplicates automatically actually work on a Mac?

Gary Rosenzweig

5 years ago

John: Not sure what you mean by "automatically work on a Mac?" Automatically do what, exactly? I don't see how a flash drive would help you remove duplicates.