How to delete duplicate photos on iPhone

1. Use the built-in Duplicates album

Since iOS 16, the Photos app looks for duplicate photos on its own and collects them in an album called Duplicates. It finds exact copies, and also copies that look the same but differ in size or format, like a photo you saved twice from a chat.

1. Open Photos and scroll down to Utilities. On older layouts it is under Albums → Utilities.
2. Tap Duplicates. Each set shows the copies side by side, with their file size and date.
3. Tap Merge next to a set, then confirm.

Merging keeps the highest quality version and combines relevant data from the copies into it, such as captions, keywords and favourites. The other copies move to Recently Deleted.

To clear many sets at once, tap Select in the top corner. Pick the sets you want, or tap Select All, then tap Merge. On most versions iOS tells you how many copies it will merge before you confirm.

If you use iCloud Photos, merges sync across your devices. Merge on your iPhone and the extra copies disappear from your iPad and Mac too.

No Duplicates album? It only shows up when Photos has found at least one set. On a big library the phone may still be indexing your photos, which it does in the background. Leave the iPhone locked and charging overnight, then look again.

2. Empty Recently Deleted

Merged copies don’t free space right away. They sit in Recently Deleted for up to 30 days, just in case you change your mind. To get the space back now:

1. In Photos, scroll down to Utilities and tap Recently Deleted.
2. Unlock it with Face ID, Touch ID or your passcode.
3. Tap Select → Delete All. This cannot be undone, so have a quick look through first.

3. What the built-in tool misses

The Duplicates album is careful by design. It only groups photos that are the same picture. That leaves out most of what actually clutters a camera roll:

• Similar shots. Five takes of the same group photo, ten photos of one sunset, a plate of food from three angles. They are different photos, so iOS keeps them all.
• Bursts. Hold the shutter and you get dozens of frames in a second. Usually you want one.
• Blurry near-copies. The shot before the sharp one, where someone moved or the camera hadn’t focused yet.
• Edited copies. In some cases a duplicated and edited photo isn’t matched to the original.
• Screenshots of the same thing. The same map, ticket or chat captured several times.

This is where most of the wasted space is. Exact duplicates are usually a small slice of a library. Similar photos pile up every time you take a picture, because most of us take several to get one good one.

4. Clean up Burst photos

Bursts are stored as one stack, but every frame takes up space. You can keep the best frames and drop the rest.

1. Open Photos → Media Types → Bursts. On most versions Media Types is further down the main Photos screen, or under Albums on older layouts.
2. Open a burst and tap Select… at the bottom.
3. Swipe through the frames and tap the ones you want to keep. They get a tick.
4. Tap Done, then choose Keep Only N Favourites. The rest go to Recently Deleted.

5. Review similar photos by hand

You can do a lot without any app. A few tips make it faster:

• Start with Media Types. Media Types → Screenshots and Live Photos are quick wins. Old screenshots are almost never worth keeping.
• Go by date. Similar shots are taken seconds apart, so they sit next to each other in the library. Scroll one day or trip at a time.
• Drag to select. Tap Select, then drag your finger across a row of thumbnails to pick many at once instead of tapping each one.
• Keep one, delete the rest. Pick the sharpest shot with open eyes, favourite it with the heart, and delete the others in the set.

It works, but it is slow on a library of thousands of photos. That is the gap duplicate photo cleaner apps try to fill.

6. Use a duplicate photo cleaner app

An app can do what the Duplicates album won’t: group similar photos, not just identical ones. Decluttr AI is our app for this. It is not the only way, but here is what it does:

• Groups exact duplicates and near-duplicate, similar photos into sets.
• Picks the sharpest, best-lit shot in each set as the one to keep. You can change the pick.
• Finds blurry photos, both motion blur and out-of-focus shots. It is lenient on selfies.
• Finds large videos and screenshots.
• Lets you swipe to sort: right to keep, left to delete, up to favourite.

Deleted items go to the normal iPhone Recently Deleted album, so you can recover them for 30 days. All analysis runs on your phone. Nothing is uploaded and there is no login. The free plan includes a full scan and cleanup of up to 500 MB. Pro unlocks unlimited cleanup.

7. Before you delete

A few minutes of checking saves a lot of regret:

• Back up first. Make sure iCloud Photos is on and fully synced, or copy your library to a computer. Remember that with iCloud Photos, a deletion on one device is a deletion everywhere, so it is sync rather than a separate backup.
• Mind the 30-day window. Anything you delete or merge stays in Recently Deleted for up to 30 days. Look through it before you empty it, and don’t empty it the same minute you finish a big clean-up.
• Shared Albums are separate. Photos in Shared Albums are stored apart from your main library, so cleaning your library should not change them. If you rely on a shared album, check it afterwards.

Still short on space after this? Our guide to freeing up space on a full iPhone covers videos, Messages, apps and more.