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duplicate photos all over the place!

How do I get rid of duplicates? When I make an album to organize my pics, the original stays in "photos" but I want them out of my way, esp since many in the albums have been edited. Used to use Picasa, which was awesome for organizing. Read about Gemini 2 from MacPaw. Is this legit? Safe? Help! Ive also considered the PhotoStick to remove dupes but it costs $$ I am concerned about duplicate removal in that, what if it removes the extra from albums instead of main "Photos"? where can I learn more about this stuff?


iMac 27″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Jul 5, 2020 12:03 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 5, 2020 12:55 PM

Photos in albums are no duplicates. Albums are just referencing the photos in the library that you are seeing in AllPhotos. If you delete a photo fromAll Photos, it will vanish from all albums tat are using the photo. Think of albums as a catalog with index card. The one copy of the photo is stored in the library, and the albums are just another view of the photos, a list of photos pointing to the one copy in the library.


If you want a view, where you can find all photos that you have not yet added to an album, create a smart album.

  • File > New Smart album
  • Set the rule to "album is not Any"

This album will show you all photos that you have not sorted into an album.


Be careful with duplicate detectors. Some of them are very aggressive and can damage your Photos Library badly. I would not use any duplicate detector, that is automatically removing duplicates without collecting them in album, where you can delete them yourself. Apple is warning against such applications: Using third-party apps to remove duplicate photos might damage your Photos for macOS library - Apple Support


But your photos are no duplicates, There is no way in Photos for Mac to have a photo in an album but not in All Photos.



1 reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 5, 2020 12:55 PM in response to sugarb50

Photos in albums are no duplicates. Albums are just referencing the photos in the library that you are seeing in AllPhotos. If you delete a photo fromAll Photos, it will vanish from all albums tat are using the photo. Think of albums as a catalog with index card. The one copy of the photo is stored in the library, and the albums are just another view of the photos, a list of photos pointing to the one copy in the library.


If you want a view, where you can find all photos that you have not yet added to an album, create a smart album.

  • File > New Smart album
  • Set the rule to "album is not Any"

This album will show you all photos that you have not sorted into an album.


Be careful with duplicate detectors. Some of them are very aggressive and can damage your Photos Library badly. I would not use any duplicate detector, that is automatically removing duplicates without collecting them in album, where you can delete them yourself. Apple is warning against such applications: Using third-party apps to remove duplicate photos might damage your Photos for macOS library - Apple Support


But your photos are no duplicates, There is no way in Photos for Mac to have a photo in an album but not in All Photos.



duplicate photos all over the place!

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