Last Updated on: 18th December 2018, 08:46 pm
When using WooCommerce Product CSV Import Suite you may at one point find yourself with duplicated images in your media library.
WooCommerce has an FAQ here that explains how to avoid physical duplication of image files on your server.
The images will still always be duplicated in your Media Library though, here is why.
The extension uses the WP importer. The WP importer dictates a 1:1 relationship of product and image. We have yet to find a way to circumvent this. However seeing the image in your media library multiple times does not mean it was duplicated on your server physically.
The duplication in the media library is normal.
The reason it appears as duplicate in the media library is because there’s no way to check if the image already exists in the media library at the time of the import process. The image could exist anywhere on your site.
For example if you were to manually upload those images via FTP, they would not be in your media library (if you need them to appear in your media library after uploading them via FTP, use this to register them to the media library or this as an alternative) . Since they wouldn’t be in the media library, they would not appear as duplicate when you upload them via CSV. The images you had uploaded however are appearing as duplicate in the media library because it’s adding another entry for the image you uploaded with the CSV (keep in mind it is just an entry).
It’s important to note however that duplicate entries in the media library does not mean it’s been duplicating on your server. If you insert image.png into the images column, it will only generate/create thumbnails. It will not duplicate the image itself on your own server.
The only way it will duplicate on your own server is if you use the full URL path rather than putting the location of the image within your own server. So simply only use the image.png in the column to avoid using too much space.
Furthermore you can try and use Media Deduper for finding and managing duplicates. If you do I am curious to know how it goes.
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