How To Manage Duplicate Photos on Windows 11

The best way to preserve memories and revisit our priceless moments is to take pictures. The software storage space might quickly get cluttered with unaccounted duplicate photographs because they are the most prominent space hogs.

To avoid photo bloat, we need to arrange and trim down the number of photos we transfer to the Windows 11 PC. If done incorrectly, a straightforward image transfer and uploading can result in a significant amount of duplication. 

These duplicates eventually occupy your storage space and make it challenging to locate the ones you actually need. Hence, it is necessary to manage and remove any unnecessary duplicate images from your system.

In this article, we are going to discuss some manual methods to manage such photographs on your system and also the automatic way of using any duplicate file finder software. 

Reasons Behind the Accumulation of the Duplicates

Here are some of the common reasons you might perform accidentally.

• Multiple copies of the exact same file are made.
• The identical file was downloaded many times.
• Unrelated pictures are downloaded at random.
• The same image is being sent and received repeatedly.

The causes of duplicate images accumulating are now evident. Let’s get to the section where we’ll discover how to get rid of the same pictures.

Easy Ways to Fix the Duplicates

Below are some solutions you can implement to your system to manage your images effectively.

Utilize the Windows Photos App 

On Windows 11, Microsoft provides one of the easiest ways to remove duplicate photos. Yes, with the assistance of the Windows Photos program. Other functions it offers make it possible to get rid of duplicate files. 

Let’s look at the steps for erasing the photos in Windows 11:

1. From your application drawer, launch the Microsoft Photos app. The Windows menu also has a search function for the software. 
2. Click to access the folder you wish to inspect first for duplicate pictures after it has opened.
3. From the Windows menu, open the Microsoft Photos program. 
4. Go to the folder where you want to look for duplicate pictures.
5. Look through the images to find any duplicates. To send an image to the Recycle Bin, right-click on it after selecting it and choose Delete. 
6. Press the Shift and delete keys on the keyboard to keep it from going to the Trash.
7. If you have a lot of duplicate photos, pick several with the mouse while holding down the CTRL key. 
8. To move items to the Recycle Bin after selection, press the Delete key. 
9. Utilize the Shift+Delete key shortcut to remove them permanently from the system.

On Windows 11, you can manage photos in this manner by using the Photos App to remove duplicate pictures.

Utilize the File Explorer Application 

Follow the below steps to delete the duplicates easily.

1. First, open File explorer on your desktop and sort the files based on their names.
2. After sorting the files by Name and going to the Details view, you can then pick each duplicate file individually.
3. Now, either click the Delete button in the Command Bar or press the Del key to delete it.
4. To delete multiple files at once, it would be easier to hold down the Ctrl key while selecting each file, then press the Del key.
5. In either scenario, if a confirmation box appears, click Yes.

Even though this is arguably the most straightforward method for deleting identical files in Windows 11, it is undoubtedly a tedious procedure.

Utilize the Command Prompt Tool

Follow the below instructions to delete the duplicates easily.

1. Locate the folder containing the duplicate files that need to be deleted, then use the context menu to right-click on it and choose Copy as the path.
2. When you know the folder’s path, use Windows + S to open the search menu.
3. Use the text area at the top to type Windows Terminal.
4. Click with the right mouse button on the appropriate search result, then choose Run as administrator from the menu that appears.
5. The User Account Control (UAC) prompt will appear; click Yes to accept it.
6. Then, from the menu of options, click on the downward-pointing arrow at the top and choose Command Prompt. 
7. As an alternative, you can open Command Prompt in a separate tab by pressing Ctrl + Shift + 2.
8. Using the real folder path that you copied previously in place of the placeholder in the command, type or paste the following command, then press Enter:
   cd /d “folder path”
9. Put this command into action while changing the name and extension of the files you want to delete:
   del “* – Copy.png” 
10. For example, the following command might be used to remove all.txt files ending in the number 1.

del “* – 1.txt”

If you are familiar with using commands to carry out operations, you could use a command line program to automatically remove a significant number of duplicate files at once.

Utilize any Third-Party Software

There is a tonne of third-party applications available if you search on Google. You can pick any software you find best according to your usage. We have listed some of them below. 

• Quick Photo Finder
• Duplicate Cleaner Pro
• CCleaner
• AllDup
• Duplicate Photo Remover software

..and many more.

Install any application of your choice and perform the basic steps to use it effortlessly.

To conclude, we understand how difficult it might get if you have accidentally accumulated tons of duplicate photos on your system. Therefore, you can take any of the solutions mentioned in this post whenever you encounter storage issues as a result of duplicate files.