Removing Duplicates in Calc

Free and open source spreadsheet LibreOffice Calc is a popular alternative to Microsoft Excel. For tasks like cleaning mailing lists or membership registers, you might need to remove or just find the duplicate entries.

LibreOffice 25.2 and later have a dedicated Duplicates dialog. In older versions of Calc, use the Standard Filter instead; the two tools work differently.

Let's show you how each method works for users of major editions.

How the Standard Filter works

The Standard Filter has been around for a long time.

Select the range of data to filter, then choose Data > More Filters > Standard Filter, set Field name to - none - and expand Options. Tick No duplications and click OK. Repeated rows are hidden, leaving only the first occurrence of each unique entry.

To keep the original list untouched, also tick Copy results to and pick an empty cell before clicking OK; the unique list is written there.

How the newer duplicates dialog works

Choose Data > Duplicates in the menu bar to open the dedicated dialog. Under Compare, choose rows or columns, tick Header if the first row or column holds headings, and tick the fields to compare by. Under Action, choose Remove to delete the duplicates, or Select to only highlight them, then click OK.

Excel as the comparison case

Windows desktop users expecting similar features from Microsoft Excel will find a similar menu at Data > Remove Duplicates.