Delete numerous duplicates in iTunes 11

I've looked through the other threads that are similar but am struggling to find an answer that will work for me.
I have just reimported all of my music files into itunes, i noticed that every file was duplicated in the finder but they were not showing up in itunes, instead of going through in finder and deleting every duplicate i thought it'd be easier to import everything into itunes and have it do it for me, now that i have done this i notice that display duplicates display's every single file, including original and duplicate so i can't just mass delete them with clicking each individual one.
Is there anywhere to have it only show one of the files and not both? The files are exactly the same and date added etc the same so cant sort this way.
Cheers
Rob

Use the Songs view. Hold down alt/option and use View > Show Exact Duplicate Items, sort the resulting list on Date Added, then delete the most recent additons, leaving the originals behind. Ideally you should take a complete backup of the current state of the library & media folder before you start just in case you select more files to delete than you should.
Oops, I've seen where you say the files have the same date added values... In that case you either need to manually select all but one of each repeating group to remove using CMD-clicks, or look to third party tools such as Dupin or Dupin Lite from Doug's Scripts.
tt2

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HT2905 Is there a way to automatically delete exact duplicates in iTunes 11

Has anyone found a way to automatically delete Exact Duplicates from iTunes 11. As I read the instructions, it can only be done by comparing the songs with the same title, making sure that it is the same album, etc. Then I have been going through the duplicates and pressing CTRL in Windows to select the next duplicate song to delete. I have a very large library and this is going to take hours.
I guess I didn't get the instructions correctly when I backed up my Library to move from an old laptop to a new one. I am going to have to go back and read those again because this brand new HP is having problems like the past few that I have received from HP. I will never recommend an HP Product, I can tell you that.
Thanks to all for reading this and I hope someone has an answer to automate it.

When deduping use Shift > View > Show Exact Duplicate Items as this is normally a more useful selection. You need to manually select all but one of each group to remove. Sorting the list by Date Added may make it easier to select the appropriate tracks. If you have multiple entries in iTunes connected to the same file on the hard drive then don't send to the recycle bin. Use my DeDuper script if you're not sure, don't want to do it by hand, or want to preserve ratings, play counts and playlist membership. See this thread for background and please take note of the warning to backup your library before deduping.
(If you don't see the menu bar press ALT to show it temporarily or CTRL+B to keep it displayed)
See also HT2905: How to find and remove duplicate items in your iTunes library.
(Duplicate link)
If you still have the original library on the old laptop see this migrate iTunes library post. It may be easier and/or better to redo the transfer...
tt2

Delete all duplicates in iTunes at once

In iTunes 12.1.0.50 on a Mavericks iMac, how can I delete all duplicate songs at once?

Realize the link to which ChitlinsCC posted is in the iTunes for Windows forum. It mentions a script which will only work in Windows iTunes. I have not used it but the Dougscripts web site includes a tool for removing duplicates which works on Macs.
Do heed turingtest2's warnings about blindly removing duplicates. There are several kinds of duplicates and deleting some may result in both disappearing completely from your computer. I find in the normal course of things I generate only one or two duplicates per year. If you are finding many more then we need to review what is going on with your computer to generate all the extras.

How to delete multiple duplicates in itunes 11.2

I've seen lot's of people talking about the "Show exact duplicates" funtion, but I can't figure out how to make it work in 11.2. I have over 6,000 duplciates and need an easier way to delete them other than one by one. please help?

Apple's official advice is here... HT2905 - How to find and remove duplicate items in your iTunes library. It is a manual process and the article fails to explain some of the potential pitfalls such as lost ratings and playlist membership.
Use Shift > View > Show Exact Duplicate Items to display duplicates as this is normally a more useful selection. You need to manually select all but one of each group to remove. Sorting the list by Date Added may make it easier to select the appropriate tracks, however this works best when performed immediately after the dupes have been created. If you have multiple entries in iTunes connected to the same file on the hard drive then don't send to the recycle bin.
Use my DeDuper script if you're not sure, don't want to do it by hand, or want to preserve ratings, play counts and playlist membership. See this thread for background, this post for detailed instructions, and please take note of the warning to backup your library before deduping.
(If you don't see the menu bar press ALT to show it temporarily or CTRL+B to keep it displayed.)
tt2

How do you delete numerous duplicates at one time? Can you?

I have bought a new computer and want to merge my IPod Itunes content and my PC content as I used my Classic IPod more as a hardware place to store everything. I can get it to display duplicates, but there are so many I wondered if I could just delete all the duplicates at one time instead of one at a time? Thanks for any help. I apologize beforehand, I don't do many forums and don't know if this issue has already been addressed elsewhere, I'm sure it does probably, I'm just too much of a computer dork to figure it out.

I've written a script called DeDuper which can help remove unwanted duplicates. See this thread for background.
Note the current version does not address dupes of different sizes, i.e. the same track ripped at different bit rates. I've almost finished an updated version which can optionally remove all but the largest of these and now also merges playlist membership (though not necessarily the position).
tt2

HT1349 I want to delete many duplicates in itunes on my pc

i have threee of every song, two will play, i want to remove the duplictes and simplify my view. i know one path is to an external hard-drive that is linked to my itunes, but don't need 'cause its on my hard drive now, twice, apparently

I've written a script called DeDuper which can help remove unwanted duplicates. See this thread for background.
The current version doesn't handle missing files. These can either be deleted using a tool such as iTunes Folder Watch with its option to check for dead tracks on startup or repaired with my FindTracks script. Which approach you want to take depends on whether or not there are ratings/play counts/playlist memberships you want to merge into the tracks you are retaining.
tt2

Deleting multiple duplicates in itunes

Can Someone please tell me a way to delete hundreds of multiple files , songs in Itunes quickly instead of one at a time

I've written a script called DeDuper which can help remove unwanted duplicates. See this thread for background.
tt2

How do i delete multiple duplicates

How can i delete multiple duplicates in itunes? thanks

I've written a script called DeDuper which can help remove unwanted duplicates. See this thread for background.
tt2

IPad2... after synch with my Mac, I now have numerous duplicates of the same PDF files in Books. Can't select them to delete them. Can't move them. Any suggestions?

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<Email Edited by Host>

Hi sdfulbright,
Open iTunes, and under View, select "Show Sidebar". The old sidebar you are used to will show up, and everything will work the way it did under the old iTunes.
Hope this helps!
Cheers,
GB

HT4915 When i did my itunes match, there were some duplicated albums and songs. I have gone into my library and deleted the duplicates, but they still show up on my iphone as duplicates. What can i do to get rid of them?

When I did my itunes match, there were some duplicated albums and songs in my library. I have gone back into my library from my computer, and deleted the duplicates. When I did so, itunes did not ask me if I wanted to delete them from the cloud. They are still showing up on my iphone as duplicates in the cloud. What can I do to get them from showing up in my iphone?

They are not on the iphone in the first place. It is just a setting that allows you to see the songs that are available in icloud, but not on your iphone. If you turn the setting to off, then you no longer see the songs that are in icloud, but NOT on your iphone.

How to delete duplicates from iTunes but not hard drive

I'm running iTunes 10 and have my music stored on both my NAS drive and backup drive. Each track appears twice on iTunes: once as lossless for streaming and and once as compressed AAC files for synching to ipods and iphones.
For some reason, when my PC is turned on after being turned on, the linkstation cannon be 'seen' by iTunes, and therefore if I try to play a track, 'the original file cannot be found'. If I use the 'add folder to library' option in the 'file' dropdown menu, the tracks are located again.
Unfortunately, I the last time I did this it resulted in 4 copies of each song on itunes; 2 lossless and 2 AAC.
I have 2 questions:
Firstly is there an easy way to delete the duplicates from my iTunes library so that I am left with only 1 lossless and one AAC copy, but not deleing the files from my NAS and backup drive?
Is there a way I can just store my music as lossless, but convert it easily to aa more compressed format for synching to iphone and ipod?
Thanks!

You can try my new DeDupe script. It should be able to get rid of the redundant copies while keeping one copy of each track in each format. See this thread for background.
I've not used the feature, but iTunes can downsample to 128k AAC on the fly as it syncs your devices. Of course you might find the process is too slow for your needs or find that 128k is too much compression.
tt2

I just upgraded to the latest version of iTunes and it duplicated virtually every track in my music library. I need a quick way to delete the duplicates. Sorting by "Date Added" will not help because they are all listed as added on 12/12/2011.

Library Duplicated
I just updated to the latest version of iTunes and it duplicated virtually every track in my library. I need a quick way to delete the duplicates. Sorting by "Date Added" will not work, because every track is listed as added on 12/12/2011 even though this happened today 12/19/2011.

I've written a script called DeDuper which can help remove unwanted duplicates. See this thread for background.
tt2

I have more than 7600 duplicates in itunes! I have no idea how this happened. How do I efficiently get rid of them without deleting one at a time?

I have 7600 duplicates on my itunes account. I have no idea how this happened and want to delete the duplicates en mass.
Is it possible? How would I do it?
This happened just recently.
I do have a backup on My Book that may not have the duplicates. Not sure I WANT TO GO NUCLEAR THOUGH AND DELETE ALL THE DUPLICATES.
ANY HELP WOULD BE APPRECIATED.
THANK YOU.
TODD

If you've recently created a bunch of duplicates then, with the main Music playlist showing, hold down Option (Mac) or Shift (PC) and then the menu File > Display Exact Duplicates. Sort the resulting list on the Date Added field, select the range of tracks representing the recent imports which you know to be duplicates and delete.
To delete any older duplicates scattered through the library sort the list in a conventional order like Album by Artist and delete all but one copy of each cluster of identical tracks.
Normally when you delete the duplicate entries from the library you will also want to delete the underlying files, however in certain circumstances it is possible for iTunes to make two separate entries to the same physical file on your hard drive. In this case deleting the file for the one entry will break the other one. If possible try to work out which type of duplicates you have before deleting any files, and check that the remaining entries play before emptying the trash.
tt2

If I've downloaded my music to an itunes library from an external hard drive and I have several duplicate songs, is there an easy way to delete the duplicate songs? Or, do I have to go through my entire library song by song to delete duplicates?

If I've downloaded my music to an itunes library from an external hard drive and I have several duplicate songs, is there an easy way to delete the duplicate songs? Or, do I have to go through my entire library song by song to delete duplicates?

In iTunes, File>Display Duplicates

I recently deleted many duplicate files. In the midst of it my Itunes songs are not in Itunes. They are in two different folders. One under 'Music' in my ID. And two under a MyMusic file in Documents. How do I know which one to import?

I recently deleted many duplicate files. In the midst of it my Itunes songs are not in Itunes. They are in two different folders. One under 'Music' in my ID. And two under a MyMusic file in Documents. How do I know which one to import?

Thanks, this is not an ideal answer but probably the most sensible one in my case.
I will try it unless someone has a better suggestion, but I'll wait a bit as it will take me a few days anyway (I had actually tried to create a new smaller playlist or download by album, but at this stage the music app is not letting me queue a list of songs for download - I think I will have to disable and re-enable iTunes match which will probably delete all the songs).
I have to say I am not very impressed with Apple here - having an online backup of all your data and beeing able to restore it to a new device easily was a strong selling point of iCloud. For music, they are Definitly not delivering at the stage.

Delete numerous duplicates in iTunes 11

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