Best Duplicate File Finder for Windows
You are downloading too much shit. Sometimes you download the same crap a few times. Even if you need to keep these files, you won’t need two of them. To get rid of deceptions, we recommend dupeGuru.
dupeGuru
Platform: Windows Price: Free download page
Functions:
- Fuzzy matching algorithms can find files with identical or similar filenames.
- Matches the file type (ie, maps a JPEG to an identical PNG).
- Custom filtering allows you to customize rules and match severity.
- Automatically delete empty folders when deleting files.
- Selecting one button to remove duplicates.
- Move the duplicates to a separate folder.
- Run custom terminal commands for originals or duplicates.
- Special versions for cleaning music and pictures.
Where is it best
Of all the duplicate finders we’ve tried, dupeFinder was the simplest and still impressive. To start scanning, you simply add the folder to the main window and click Scan. Very simple. In a minute or two, you will receive a list of all files the application found duplicates of. The original file will be highlighted in blue and the rest will be highlighted in black, making the list easier to read.
Once you have trickery, you can quickly deal with them. The “Duplicates Only” checkbox will only show you secondary copies to make them a little easier to read. You can also see the size of the files, as well as the percentage of matches, to quickly determine how identical a file is. You may have files that are close enough for the application to catch, but different enough that you need both, so dupeGuru gives you the tools to differentiate between the two.
However, the best feature of the app is that it has two separate companion apps. dupeGuru Picture Edition and dupeGuru Music Edition are specially designed to clean up your photos and music collections respectively. Picture Edition scans the contents of an image for duplicates, which may have completely different file names or even sizes, but are actually the same image. It also includes an image preview window that compares the original to
Music Edition can scan special music metadata like tags, bit rate, duration, or audio content. Some of these scans may take longer, but the image and music libraries can become so out of control that they need extra attention.
Where it fails
In terms of finding duplicate files, dupeGuru is hard to beat. However, it can take up to three separate downloads to thoroughly test your library, which is annoying. While the interface is pretty clean, it also has a ton of additional features that can overwhelm the average user.
Picture and Music editions are also quite slow. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, if you have a large collection, you should probably start scanning and grab a bite to eat. Or watch a movie if you have a really large library.
Competition
We usually don’t exclude apps just because they include unwanted software (assuming you can avoid it), but with so many duplicate finder options that do basically the same thing, we’ve decided to focus on clean ones only. … For this reason, CCleaner gets an automatic recommendation as it is already one of our favorite apps . From the Tools sidebar, select Duplicate Finder to scan your system. It is not as functional as some of the other tools, but if you are already using CCleaner, this is the most convenient option you have.
SearchMyFiles is another good option that includes some heavy filtering options and robust comparison tools. You can narrow your search by file size, date and time, specific file extensions, and more. This is less useful for super-fast cleanups, but can give you a lot more control if you want to do the job manually.
Duplicate Files Finder is another robust, albeit simplistic, option. While it doesn’t have many unique features (it’s not even the only app with that name ), it is one of the fastest. It will scan specific folders and find files that are the same size and then compare them to make sure they are identical. Since it only compares files of the same size, it is insanely fast. However, this also limits the effectiveness of finding more fuzzy matches. If you just want to free up space, this can be done in just a couple of clicks. But don’t expect to completely empty your hard drive afterwards.
However, these are just a few of the possible options. There are roughly 2.7 billion duplicate finder apps per person on the planet (yes, we count), so you may find others that have different benefits. These are the ones that, in our opinion, deserve your attention the most of the ones that we researched. If you have any suggestions on another matter, do not write in the comments!