Safely Clean Duplicate Images: From Enabling Detection to Confirming Deletion

Duplicate cleanup should be careful. The app can find likely duplicates, but you decide what to keep.

1. Enable Duplicate Detection

Open Tools → Settings → Add Files. Under Find Duplicate Images, enable Calculate duplicate image hashes when adding files. This prepares data for newly added images and controls the duplicate-search entry. Enabling it does not start a search or delete anything.

2. Prepare Duplicate Data

Images added before enabling the setting may lack duplicate data. Refresh or repair the database to fill it in, then open the background task list and wait for processing to finish. Few results can mean incomplete data rather than few duplicates. Try one project folder before processing a large library.

3. Choose a Scope

Click Duplicates at the top of the search workspace. Choose the whole database, a project folder, or a collection, select the detection method, and start. A smaller scope makes the first review easier to manage.

4. Review Duplicate Groups

Open each group and compare images manually. Look at resolution, clarity, watermarks, edits, file names, and source paths.

Keep at least one image per group unless you have confirmed that the whole group is unnecessary. Similar-looking files may be useful edits or variants. Prefer the version with the quality, naming, location, and project usage you need.

5. Confirm the Removal Action

• Remove from app: keeps source files but removes database records.
• Delete from device: requests moving source files to the system recycle bin; check the actual result and do not rely on the recycle bin as a backup.

Removing from a collection is a separate action available in collection views; it is not offered by this duplicate-group removal dialog.

Select candidates, open the removal dialog, and read the selected action before confirming. Removing from the app keeps originals; removing from a collection keeps both database records and originals.

6. Confirm Results After Deletion

Run duplicate detection again with the same scope to check the remaining groups. If you deleted originals accidentally, check the recycle bin or your source backup, restore files, then refresh the database. Refresh alone cannot restore deleted originals. Restoring a source file does not automatically restore removed notes or collection relationships.

Safe Cleanup Suggestions

Start with a small folder or collection. Back up important original files before large deletions. The duplicate drawer has no candidate-list export. If unsure, cancel and review further. A database backup preserves records but cannot restore missing source files. Check intended project use as well as image quality, and remove an item from the collection when that is all you need.

Common Cases

• Groups contain similar but useful variants: keep them.
• You deleted by mistake: check the system recycle bin immediately.
• Detection misses files: refresh or rebuild duplicate data.

Example Groups

The sample library contains four landscape photos and one identical backup of each. Exact-duplicate search produces four groups of two and preselects four removal candidates. A selected checkbox means a candidate for removal, not a file already deleted. Review the suggested keeper and cancel the removal dialog if you do not want to proceed.