# Duplicate Contacts RelayBook automatically detects potential duplicate contacts using email, phone, and name matching. Review matches and merge them to keep your books clean. > [!quote] One Contact, One Record > Find duplicates before they cause confusion — ==merge them into a single, complete record==. ## Finding Duplicates 1. Open the **book dropdown** (click the book name in the sidebar) 2. Click **Find Duplicates** 3. RelayBook scans your contacts and shows potential matches ## How Matching Works Duplicates are detected using three methods, in order of confidence: | Method | Confidence | How It Works | |---|---|---| | **Same email** | High | Two or more contacts share an identical email address | | **Same phone** | High | Two or more contacts share the same phone number (ignoring formatting) | | **Similar name** | Medium | Names are fuzzy-matched using similarity scoring (threshold: 60%) | > [!note] Smart deduplication > Phone matching strips formatting — so `+44 7911 123456` and `07911123456` are recognised as the same number. Email matching is exact. Name matching uses linguistic similarity to catch misspellings and variations. ## Reviewing Duplicates Each duplicate group shows: - **Overlapping avatars** of the matched contacts - **Contact names** listed together - **Confidence level** — High or Medium - **Reason** — why they were flagged (e.g. "Same email: [email protected]") Click a group to expand it and see full details for each contact. ## Merging Contacts 1. Click a duplicate group to expand it 2. **Select the primary contact** — this is the record that will be kept 3. Click **Merge** ### What Happens During a Merge - The **primary contact** is kept - **Blank fields** on the primary are filled from the secondary contacts - **Emails, phones, addresses, and social links** are combined (deduplicated) - **Labels** from all contacts are merged together - **Interactions** (calls, notes, meetings) are reassigned to the primary - Secondary contacts are **deleted** > [!tip] Choose the best primary > Pick the contact with the most complete and accurate data as the primary. Its fields take precedence over the others. ## Dismissing False Positives Not every match is a real duplicate. Click **Dismiss** to remove a group from the list without merging. This only affects the current scan — the contacts are not changed. > [!success] The Key Idea > Regularly scan for duplicates to keep your books clean. Smart matching catches what manual review might miss, and merging preserves all your data in a single record. --- **Next:** Learn about importing contacts with [[CSV Import]].