Reading the duplicates results

The results screen answers one question first — how much space you can recover — and then lets you work down from there.

The header states the scan:

412 groups · 1,286 files · 38.4 GiB reclaimable

Both figures can be smaller than the sum of file sizes, and when they are, the header says why: · 7.1 GiB shared by clones for APFS clones, and 34,833 linked names for files reachable under more than one name, such as hard links.

When a filter is active, that reclaimable figure is the filtered total, not the scan’s.

Groups

Each group headline is the space it would free — not its total size. Under it:

• 4.7 MiB each · 23.5 MiB total
• 5 copies · 4.7 MiB

The difference between each, total and reclaimable matters: removing four of five copies frees four copies’ worth, and on macOS possibly less than that if some are APFS clones.

Groups are ordered by recoverable space by default, so the top of the list is where the disk space is.

Filters

File types are filtered on the File Type Distribution itself. Each type in its list carries its file count, size and share; click one to toggle it, or ⌘-click to show that type alone. The panel can be hidden.

Search files… matches paths, debounced; Escape clears it.

Everything else is in the Filters popover, whose button counts how many are on:

• Selection — Selected groups only (G) hides every group you have not marked anything in.
• Tags — seven colors, renamed with Edit names…. Tags survive between scans.
• Formats — a searchable list of the extensions the scan found. Files with no extension get their own bucket, No extension.
• File size — the same ladder as the scan setup, applied to what you are looking at rather than to what was scanned. The range in force is shown beside it, 64 KiB – Unlimited.
• Clones — All, Only clones or No clones, shown only when some group’s copies share storage. See APFS clones.

Reset filters, at the foot of the popover, turns them all off.

Sorting

Sort	What it keys on
Recoverable space (default)	the space a group would free
Copies	how many files are in the group
File size	the size of one file
File type	category — images, videos, audio, documents
Tags	tag color

Sticky bucket headers follow the sort: From 1 GiB and up … From 0 to 100 KiB for the size sorts, From 100 files and up … From 0 to 10 files for copies, and the tag names for tags.

Recoverable space is not file size

Recoverable space sorts on what a group frees, never on any single file’s size — a group of forty 200 KiB files outranks a pair of 3 MiB ones. Sort by File size when you want the biggest individual files instead.

Selecting

Right-click a group for Select All, Deselect All, Keep Protected Files, Keep Oldest File, Keep Newest File, and Tags.

Bulk Select in the header applies the same rules across everything visible. Once you have used one, the button reads that rule — Oldest, My rules:

1. Keep by my rules (⌘R, Ctrl+R on Windows) — your own order from Settings → Selection
2. Keep Oldest File
3. Keep Newest File
4. Keep Protected Files — disabled outright when nothing is protected
5. Clear Selection

The menu ends with Edit my rules…, which opens Settings on that section.

Byte-for-byte copies are identical in every way the pixels could be read, so the rules that decide here are the ones about names and places: the name without a copy marker, the shorter path, the copy inside a folder you name.

The outcome is reported, not assumed: 128 files marked · 12 left protected · 3 groups untouched.

Rules never empty a group

Every keep-rule leaves a survivor, and skips protected folders. A group where every copy is protected says so: “Every copy is in a protected folder — none can be selected.”

Keep Protected Files is grayed out when nothing is protected rather than degrading into “select everything” — which would be a different, destructive instruction wearing the same button.

The footer, and its two numbers

The footer counts what you have marked and — when the two differ — shows a second figure labeled reclaimable.

They differ because of APFS clones. A group of clones reads 0 B reclaimable even though the files have a real size: deleting a clone frees nothing, the blocks are shared. Both numbers are true; only the second is what you get back.

Selected groups only, in Filters or with G, hides everything you did not touch. Then Review Selection — nothing leaves a folder before that screen.

When there is nothing to show

• No duplicates found — “Every scanned file is unique — there’s nothing to clean up here. Try scanning other folders, or loosening the size and extension filters.”
• No matches with these filters — “Current filters hide every group.” with Clear filters.

Read the first one with the floor in mind: a scan that finds nothing at the 64 KiB default usually means the duplicates are smaller than the floor, not that there are none.

On the free tier

Duplicates results are not truncated by tier: every group and file is shown. What free caps is how much a single operation may move: 25 files or 500 MiB, with the rest staying marked for the next pass. See Review Selection.

Before this

Setting up a scan — the controls that decided what you are looking at.

Next

Review Selection — the screen between marking and removing.