iOS 16.4’s Photos app detects duplicates in your shared image library

Update your iPhone, iPad or Mac to iOS 16.4, iPadOS 16.4 or macOS Ventura 13.3 to have the Photos app detect duplicates in your iCloud Shared Photo Library.

The iCloud Photo Sharing Library feature in the Photos and Camera apps on iPhone
iCloud Photo Sharing Library in Photos and Camera | Image: Christian Zibreg/iDB
  • What’s happening? iOS 16.4 updates the duplicate image finder in the Photos app to identify identical items in your shared libraries, too.
  • Why care? You can save even more storage space by finding and eliminating duplicate images and videos in your shared photo library.
  • What to do? Open the Duplicates album after updating to iOS 16.4 to see if Photos has found any duplicates in your shared library.

Detecting duplicates in your iCloud Shared Photo Library

Among many changes and enhancements in iOS 16.4 is an expansion of the Duplicates album in the Photos app. The feature has been expanded to find duplicate photos and videos stored in an iCloud Shared Photo Library.

Before iOS 16.4, it was limited to personal photo libraries.

“Duplicates album in Photos expands support to detect duplicate photos and videos in an iCloud Shared Photo Library,” according to the iOS 16.4 release notes. This enhanced photo-sharing feature in iOS 16.4 is also available on the iPad and Mac with the iPadOS 16.4 and macOS Ventura 13.3 updates.

What is iCloud Shared Photo Library?

Apple's new iCloud Shared Photo Library feature in iPadOS 16, showcased on iPad
iCloud Shared Photo Library on iPad| Image: Apple

iCloud Shared Photo Library lets you create another image library alongside your personal one to share photos and videos with up to five other people.

You can switch between viewing your shared and personal libraries (or both) in the Photos app. The integration extends to the Camera app, which provides a switch for saving captured images directly to the shared library. There’s also a setting in the Photos app to automatically share these items with nearby participants.

iCloud Shared Photo Library requirements

iCloud Shared Photo Library requires iOS 16.1, iPadOS 16.1 and macOS Ventura 13.0 and later. Check out Apple’s website for the steps to set up and view an iCloud Shared Photo Library on all your devices, including the iCloud.com website.