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Why are old duplicate photos in my Google Drive folders and what should I do with them?
Jeremy asks:
I just noticed that Google seems to have duplicate copies of my whole photo library, which, I'm guessing, is a waste of space. There's a whole directory in My Drive that seems to be a duplicate of old family photos I scanned years ago, sorted by year and, I guess, not really needed.
What's going on here? Does this count against my Google storage limit? Most importantly, can I delete all this?
Hi Jeremy! You've stumbled across a secret Google feature that gives you a look at what sets Google apart when it comes to online services: the unintended, multilayered problem.
On a serious note, this happens (or happened, as we'll see later) to some folks who used Google Photos in its early days but didn't affect others. The short answer to your questions: you're seeing duplicates because Google Photos stores its files in a hidden folder in your shared Google storage. Yes, it counts against your storage the same way any files you purposefully uploaded to Google Drive, and you can delete the folder(s) from Google Drive after you verify you have copies in the Google Photos app. For a discussion of the mess, read on!
Not everyone sees these old duplicate files. At some point, Google changed how Photos stores its data, but it still is part of your overall storage space provided by Google. Before this, you could see your Google Photos storage in Drive if you knew where and how to look for it, but it was intended to be hidden.
During the transition, some people had folders duplicated while the way they were stored changed. I've heard this has to do with specific metadata, how the files were added to Photos, or what device was used to upload them. These theories could be correct, or they could be 100% wrong; regardless, it happened, and when it happened, the folders became visible like any other folder in Drive.
These folders are no longer associated with Google Photos and that means they are duplicated elsewhere in a way you can't (easily) find them. It also means they are taking up space.
You have a limited amount of space associated with your Google account. You can pay to have more if you need it, or you can manage your stored and saved files so you don't reach the limit.
These duplicate folders can be safely deleted once you've double-checked to make sure the photos are also stored in the Google Photos app. Do not delete them until you have checked. Never trust anything without verifying it for yourself.
One thing you might want to look at before you delete anything is the quality of the photo being stored, especially if you used to have an original Pixel or a Pixel 2.
It used to be that if you had a Pixel phone, your photos were stored at full quality without any cost to your shared storage allotment. Other photos had their quality reduced; it was still high-quality and is likely good enough for anything other than trying to have physical prints made, but there is a difference.
There is a chance that these "duplicate" photos would be full quality and the photos in Google Photos are not. This situation happened to me when I got hit with the weird duplication bug/mess/Googleism. A bunch of photos I took with the first Pixel phone were stored in full resolution and quality in my Google Drive but the "copies" in Google Photos were not.
It's up to you to decide if you want or need these larger-sized files (I didn't), but if you don't know and don't check, you can't decide.
One last thing to note — this happened to a lot of people, and it's probably worth checking if you are one of them and don't know it. Just open your Google Drive and look through all the stuff that's stored there. If you see folders full of pictures, this is probably why.
