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When I delete all the photos in the duplicate album they remain in the library. Duplicate File Finder moves my duplicates to the Duplicates Album. what's goin' on? How can I batch remove duplicates? Why is there zero help on this issue? (Other than database advice, but everything else is working great in my photo library.
MacBook, macOS 11.2
How are you 'deleting' the photos? If you press delete then the photos are just removed from the album, but if you press CMD-delete then the photos are deleted.
How are you 'deleting' the photos? If you press delete then the photos are just removed from the album, but if you press CMD-delete then the photos are deleted.
For future reference:
Deleting Photos from a Photos Library
1 - regardless of where you are in the library, i.e. Photos, Memories, Favorites, People, Recents, Imports, albums or smart albums, select the photo(s) you want to delete and use the key combination of Command+Delete to move the photos to the Recently Deleted smart album. Without the Command key held down you'll be presented with a confirmation Yes/No window regarding the deletion.
2 - click on the Recently Deleted smart albums in the sidebar.
NOTE 1: If you're using Photos 1.2 or earlier use the File ➙ Show Recently Deleted menu option.
3 - in the Recently Deleted album you can opt to let the photo automatically delete after the 30 day waiting period is up, delete them immediately or restore them to the library.
NOTE 2: deleting a photo from an album, slideshow, book, etc., with the Delete key only deletes the photo from that item. There is no key combination that will delete a photo from a project and move it directly to the Recently Deleted smart album.
NOTE 3: deleting a photo from a Moment or Collection (the Photos window) or the All Photos window deletes ALL occurences of that photo in the library.
Thanks so much, Russ, I just hit the "solved the issue" button. It's extremely annoying that Apple can't include that basic info in the photos user guide. I wasted a lot of time hunting for something that's not there.
FYI, the issue arose when I used Duplicate File Finder (awful, horrible app) to clean my photos library. It easily moved my selected photos to the photos duplicates album and tells you to delete them there using the Command-A to select and hit the delete key. Dummies. Nothing about what you knew to actually remove them from the library, not just the album.
Anyway, solving that problem revealed a new issue. A lot of my duplicates are identical file names in the photos library folder. When I delete all the duplicates (which are the same file) IN THE DUPLICATES ALBUM, it even deletes the original photo (when all my photos are identical files). What's up with that? How do keep one of the photos?
Then there's another issue in this mess. When I delete one of the identical files in the LIBRARY, the photo disappears as intended, leaving the other photo even with the same file name. But when I close photos and reopen it, the photo is back.
You're welcome. I know its annoying when the simplest of things seem difficult to do. By the way if you are in the main library view rather than the album view then you can delete a photo just by pressing delete - yes the keyboard shortcut differs depending on which view you are in!
That app doesn't sound very good. The best app for identifying duplicates is Power Photos by Fat Cat. It is a paid app unfortunately but it allows you to set various rules to identify duplicates. I've never had any problem using it. I'm pretty sure it does also create an album in Photos that you can review before deleting photos, but it does identify true duplicates. Not sure about your problems above, it could be that you have triplicates of some of the photos so even when you delete one, you still have a duplicate.
With Power Photos even if there are 5 copies of the same photo, it will show you this and you decide which ones to keep or delete. In some cases you may want to keep duplicates, eg if you have a B&W copy of the photo.
Duplicate album issue
