Contacts crashes upon attempting to "Look for Duplicates..."

Okay... this time I definitely closed Contacts, then deleted the "AddressBook-v22.abcddb" file. It didn't help, but neither did it increase the number of contacts.

It DID, however, mess with the groups.

Here are two screenshots, one of the group 5 Generation Bakers. Before these screenshots there were 3 or 4 of each group. Now, in many cases, there are 5. But each group is not the same... some have one entry for each contact, some have two. Weird.

BDAqua:

Thanks for everything! I'm going to call this one "solved".

My question about deleting groups wasn't quite a simple as just "how do you delete" (although I know I made it sound that basic). I should have been more clear. The contents of each of the duplicated groups are different and are sorted differently. So, clearly, although they have the same name, in the eyes of the OS, different groups. I was hoping there was some kind of a slick merge function for groups. Alas, no. So I guess I'm just going to have to manually correct and delete them.

BTW, the multiple merging I did actually deleted a few contact that were unique, which is a drag. The good news is that most (perhaps all, I'm not sure) of the key contact I want to retain have sent me e-mails or texts. So I went through my texts and read message from senders with only phone numbers (i.e. those with no Contact entry). I then created a new contact with the person's name. From there, the OS (or Siri) on my phone is smart enough to recommend things like alternate numbers or addresses it finds elsewhere in Mail or Messages.

So... thanks bunch for your help!

I think so… But I can always try it again. ****, what’s another 3000 contacts when you already have over 9000? 😂

Yes, I do.

Ensured Contacts was not open.

Unchecked iCloud syncing.

Deleted the file.

Contacts immediately recreated a new blank one.

Checked iCloud syncing.

Launched Contacts.

Got the following screenshot.

Attempted to "Find Duplicates..."

Did not crash!

Found 6,174 duplicates.

Merged the contacts about 4-5 times to get rid of all duplicates.

Merged all duplicate data successfully!

Thank you !!

The only curious thing left is that the multiple groups are still there (see screenshot). Any ideas?