SweepiusQuick answer: Sweepius compares each photo with the one you took just before it. When two shots are near-identical and taken within 90 seconds, they’re grouped. The best one is marked Best, everything else in the set is pre-selected, and you confirm before anything is deleted.
What counts as “similar”
Most wasted space in a camera roll isn’t true duplicates — it’s the eight tries it took to get one photo where everyone’s eyes are open. Sweepius uses Apple’s on-device image analysis to measure how alike two photos look, and only compares photos taken close together in time, so two different beach days never end up in the same set.
Pro lets you choose how strict the match is: Strict for near-identical shots only, Normal for bursts and retakes, or Loose to also group shots with small changes.
Which photo it keeps
- Favorites first. A photo you’ve hearted is always the keeper, and Favorites are never pre-selected anywhere in the app.
- Then edited photos, because you put work into them.
- Then the most pixels and the biggest file, which is usually the sharpest version.
What happens when you delete
You tap Delete, iOS shows its own confirmation, and the selected photos move to Recently Deleted for 30 days. Nothing is gone for good until that album is emptied, so a wrong tap is always recoverable. For exact copies, Apple’s free Duplicates album is also worth a look — see how to delete duplicate photos on iPhone.