Cisdem Duplicate Finder offers full support for scanning and deleting duplicate files from your macOS Photos app. This guide will introduce to you how the app interacts with the photo library for safely and efficiently cleaning up duplicates.
Free Download macOS 10.11 or later
1. What to scan
The original images and videos are saved in a photo library, that is, instead of importing the Photos app, you need to import a photo library into Cisdem Duplicate Finder for scanning.
2. How to delete
The macOS Photos Library stores images in a complex, managed package, and directly deleting files from it may damage the library. Cisdem sends command to the Photos app and let it safely handle the deletion of detected duplicates. So during the deletion process, please confirm the Photos app is running.
3. What to set
Cisdem can only delete files from a system photo library, so before hitting the Delete button, please confirm your photo library is set up as a system photo library. You can just double click the target photo library to open it, click Photos> Preferences on the top menu bar, click "Use as System Photo Library" as the screenshot shown below, if the button is grey, which means the photo library is a system photo library already.
4. Where will the duplicates be removed?
Since the deletion is processed by the Photos app, the duplicates will be removed to the Recently Deleted folder.
5. Why does Cisdem detect duplicates still after the deletion
As mentioned in Question 1, all the original files are saved in a photo library, including those in the Recently Deleted folder, so if you haven’t cleared those deleted duplicates from the Recently Deleted folder, they will be scanned out during the second scan.
Follow the steps below to scan and delete duplicates from the macOS Photos app.
Step 1 Import the Photo Library
Hit 
or drag and drop the photo library into the program.
Step 2 Scan the Photo Library
Click 
to start scanning duplicate files from the Photo Library, wait until the scan completes.
Step 3 Review the scan results and delete the duplicates
Cisdem auto selects all the duplicate files for deletion after the scan completes, you can directly click the Delete button to delete all the duplicates with one click after reviewing.
Conclusion
The macOS Photos Library stores images in a complex and managed package. Cisdem Duplicate Finder doesn’t just scan the surface files, it reads the actual structure of the photo library and handles the deletion without any risk of damaging the database or corrupting your photo library. Should you have any questions about deleting duplicates from macOS Photos app, feel free to contact our support team at support@cisdem.com
Traci Gordon has worked as a tester in a software company for 8 years, she believes that the best software should be a tool that can help users accomplish what they need with the simplest steps.
