Find duplicate or unique rows in one Google sheet

Use the Remove Duplicates add-on for Google Sheets to deal with duplicated data in your table. Find, delete, move, copy, or clear duplicate or unique rows in your spreadsheet.

• Video: How to remove duplicates in Google Sheets
• Before you start
• How to use the Remove Duplicates add-on
  • Start Remove Duplicates
  • Step 1: Select your data
  • Step 2: Choose what to find
  • Step 3: Pick the columns to check
  • Step 4: Decide what to do with the found values
  • See the result

Before you start

We care about your data and suggest you always create backup copies of your spreadsheets. A special option of the add-on will do that for you if you select it.

Please bear in mind that Google Sheets limits the total number of possible cells in your file up to 2 million cells.

How to use the Remove Duplicates add-on

Start Remove Duplicates

Open the Add-ons menu, find Remove Duplicates, and click on the Find duplicate or unique rows tool:

Step 1: Select your data

Here you can select the range with the data you want to search in:

By default, the add-on highlights the entire table in the sheet of your choice.

You can alter the range by entering the needed address in the Select the range with your table field or by clicking the Select range icon. The latter will open a dialog box and allow you to pick the necessary cells:

You can choose to back up your original table by selecting the checkbox Create a backup copy of the sheet.

Click Next to proceed to the second step.

Step 2: Choose what to find

The add-on lets you check your table for 4 types of data:

• Pick Duplicates to get rid of any repeating rows in your table. The add-on will keep unique records and the first entries of any duplicates you have. Your dataset will become clear of any extra replicates:
  
• Select Duplicates + 1st occurrences to see the original entries as well as their copies:
  
• Choose the Uniques option to find only those rows that don't have any duplicates in the sheet:
  
• The Uniques + 1st occurrences option lets you find everything except for the duplicates. The add-on will look for the first entries of duplicated data in addition to unique records:
  

You can return to step 1 by clicking Back.

Click Next to go on to the next step.

Step 3: Pick the columns to check

Here you will see a list of columns in your table - tick off those you want to check for duplicates:

• You can tick off the Skip empty cells option to ignore duplicated blanks in the selected columns. Otherwise, blank matches will be considered duplicates.
• If you have header rows, make sure to check My table has headers to see your column titles. If you don't have headers, unselect this box to display column names.
  Tip. Take advantage of the 1st row content fields to see what kind of data you have in each column.
• Use the Case sensitive option to treat the records that differ only in case as uniques.
  Tip. Leading and trailing spaces in cell values are ignored by default.

Click Next to proceed to the last step.

Step 4: Decide what to do with the found values

The add-on allows you to choose one of six ways to deal with the found records:

Select the radio button next to the action you'd like to apply:

• Highlight the rows with the found entries by picking the Fill with color option. Click on the arrow next to it to pick the hue you'd like to use.
• Choose to Add a status column to identify the rows of interest in a separate column.
  Tip. You can make use of this additional column later to sort the data.
• The Copy to another location option lets you review search results in another sheet, spreadsheet, or a range of your choice.
• Cut and paste the found records to another sheet, spreadsheet, or a specific place in the document with the Move to another location option.
• Decide to Clear values to delete the found entries in the selected key columns and leave all other data intact.
• You can also remove all lines with the detected values using the Delete rows within selection option.

Click Finish to find duplicate or unique values.

See the result

Once the add-on completes the search, you will see the summary of the results with the number of found values and the action that was applied: