How to find duplicate files in google drive

Q: How do I find duplicates on a drive?

Download, install and launch Duplicate Sweeper. Click Add Folder and select the folders on your external hard drive that you wish to search for duplicates. Once all the required folders have been added, click Start Duplicate Search to begin the search.

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To remove duplicate files from Google Drive using Duplicate Sweeper, follow these steps...

Set up the Google Drive app on your PC.
Open Duplicate Sweeper and click "Add Folder".
Locate and select your Google Drive folder, or a specific folder within the drive that you wish to scan. Click OK.
Click "Start Duplicate Search".
Review the reported duplicates and mark the files that you want to remove.
Hit "Recycle Selected Duplicates" and then confirm that you wish to remove the selected duplicates.

Download Duplicate Sweeper

Detailed walkthrough steps:

You can use Duplicate Sweeper to find and remove duplicate files stored in your Google Drive storage.

You'll firstly need to ensure that your computer is synced with your Google Drive account. Download and install the Google Drive 'Backup and Sync' app from below. If you are using PC, the download includes Google Sheets, Google Slides and Google Docs, so you'll be able to edit your Drive files on your computer. Download Google Drive Now
Next, run the downloaded installer which will take you through the necessary steps that you need to do to complete the install on your computer. Once the install is complete, the setup Wizard will open automatically. The Wizard will prompt you to enter your Google account information and to *sync your Google Drive files to a folder on your computer*.
At the end of the Wizard, click Done. Google Drive will now be active on your computer, and will have created a folder called Google Drive. This folder will contain all of your synced data from your Google Drive Storage account.
Launch Duplicate Sweeper and click Add Folder. If you'd like to scan your entire Google Drive for duplicates, select the Google Drive folder (by default, this is located in your user folder area). Alternatively, you can find this folder in Windows File Explorer, and drag and drop it into Duplicate Sweeper. Click OK to add the folder.
Now click the "Start Duplicate Search" button in the top-right corner of Duplicate Sweeper.
Duplicate Sweeper will now scan the folder and return a list of any duplicate files it has found. Tick the files in each group that you wish to remove, or press the "Keep All Newest Files" to automatically select the oldest files to remove. More selection preferences can be found under the Duplicates tab of the Duplicate Sweeper toolbar.

Our Duplicate Sweeper tutorial video, goes through the steps of finding and removing duplicates using Duplicate Sweeper.

Don't forget to like & share with your friends!

Find and Remove Your Duplicate Files in Google Drive

Clean Drive will find all of your duplicate files in Google Drive and provides tools to easily remove all of your Google Drive duplicates. It starts by scanning and automatically comparing all of your Google Drive files. Then you will see a report where it shows a summary of Google Drive storage usage and all of your duplicate files. You can preview each duplicate file and delete them one by one or use the bulk delete feature to delete all of your duplicate files. You can delete all of your duplicate files by the oldest created file or the newest created file. You can also use filters to view specific duplicate files like duplicates that are older than 2 years and owned by someone else.

Features to Clean Up Google Drive

Organize Your Google Drive Storage

At a glance, view how much storage space is used by Google Photos, Gmail and Google Drive. Clean Drive shows where your storage space is being used, making it easy to organize and clean up your storage.

Find & Remove Duplicate Files in Google Drive

Clean Drive will help you locate and remove duplicate files in your Google Drive account. You can easily remove the duplicates in your account by individually selecting duplicate files, selecting all files on a page or using the Bulk Delete Tool for the entire category.

* Please note, you can find and remove photos that exist in Google Drive but finding files in Google Photos is not yet supported.

Bulk Delete in Google Drive

The Bulk Delete Tool makes it easy to clean up Google Drive with a simple click. No need to select files one by one as you can easily select all. Duplicate files can also be removed by automatically selecting the oldest or newest duplicate files.

Find Old Files

Find old files with Google Drive. View files that are older than a specific date. You can browse these files and if desired delete them with a simple click.

View Google Drive Folder Size

It’s now easy to find your large folders in Google Drive. Clean Drive will show you the size of each folder and the folders taking the most space in your Google Drive account. You can also use filters to drill down to specific folders that you would like to see.

View Empty Folders in Google Drive

Clean Drive exposes the empty folders in Google Drive. The app will show you all your empty folders, and you can use the Bulk Delete Tool to remove them with a simple click.

Locate Hidden Files in Google Drive

Hidden Files in Google Drive are quickly revealed with Clean Drive giving you control of how your storage space is used.

Surprisingly, files can consume storage space but not exist in a folder. The only way to find these files in Google Drive is to search for the exact name. Clean Drive shows all of these hidden files in one place so you can choose to delete them or move them back into a folder.

Shared Drives

If you have multiple drives and shared drives in Google Drive, you can scan them all. Before your scan starts, you will have the option to choose a specific shared drive to scan or any combination of shared drives and My Drive. This allows you to drill into the specific files you are interested in even if those files exist across multiple drives.

View Shared Files

View Files that are shared with you in Google Drive. Clean Drive will help you view who owns each file so that there is no guessing at where each file came from.

Maintain Security

We care about the privacy of your data and are committed to protecting it. Everything is transferred over a secure SSL connection and we encrypt any account information that we store. Our motivation is to help you organize Google Drive and we will not use your information for anything other than that. You can read more about this in our Privacy Policy.

Browse by File Type

Clean Drive shows your Google Drive files organized by file type categories. Would you like to see only the documents in your account? Or maybe just the images? You can even drill down to more specific file types such as PDF, Excel, JPG, etc.

How To Find and Remove Your Duplicate Files in Google Drive

Click Scan My Drive to have Clean Drive search for all of your duplicate files in Google Drive. Or you can install our Android mobile app in the Google Play store or the Galaxy store. The app is also available as a Google Drive Add-on . As soon as you start the scan, Clean Drive will analyze the files in your Google Drive account and show you your duplicate files. It can also help you find the files that are consuming the most space or that you may no longer need. Clean Drive will help you organize your duplicate files, large files, empty files, older files, files by type (such as documents, images, etc).

Clean Drive for Android App

Clean Drive for Google Workspace App

Get Clean Drive from the Google Workspace Marketplace badge

How to Clean Up Google Drive

Start your scan by logging into Clean Drive with your Google Drive account.
View Your files in Clean Drive organized into categories on the summary page.
Clean up the mess by removing files that are not needed. You can filter your results, select your files individually and delete the selected files. Or bulk delete everything in the category using the Bulk Delete Tool.

The Select, Filter, Delete and Bulk Delete Tool can be seen in the below screenshot.

Meet the Founder / Family Man

Hello! My name is Brett and I love creating apps that help the world. I built the Clean Drive app to solve my own storage dilemma and I hope it helps you as well.

After storing my files online for many years, my drive account was starting to look like it was owned by a pack rat. I knew it was time for a change. When I went to find my old files or even the files that were consuming all of my storage space, I found there was nothing to help me do it. Enter the creation of Clean Drive.

I’m a pretty laid back guy that enjoys spending time with my family and friends in the great outdoors. I have a beautiful wife and four amazing children. They are the ones that make this all worth it.

Thank you to all my loyal, friendly customers for your support. I’m grateful that you are here!

How do I clean up duplicate files in Google Drive?

Delete duplicate files.

On your Android device, open Files by Google ..

At the bottom, tap Clean ..

On the “Duplicate files” card, tap Select files..

Select the files you want to delete..

At the bottom, tap Delete ..

On the confirmation dialog, tap Delete ..

How do I find duplicates on a drive?

Download, install and launch Duplicate Sweeper. Click "Add Folder" and select the folders on your external hard drive that you wish to search for duplicates. Once all the required folders have been added, click "Start Duplicate Search" to begin the search.

What is the easiest way to find duplicate files?

List of the Best Duplicate File Finder.

XYplorer..

Auslogics Duplicate File Finder..

dupeGuru..

Easy Duplicate Finder..

Wise Duplicate Finder..

Duplicate Cleaner Pro..

Duplicate File Detective..

AllDup..

Can Google Drive find duplicate photos?

Fortunately, Google Photos arranges the images by metadata, which generally makes it easier to find duplications. However, some exclusions apply! So, here's how to find and remove Google Photos duplicates on PC, Mac, Android, and iOS.