ee.FeatureCollection.distinct

  • The distinct() method removes duplicate features from a FeatureCollection based on specified properties or geometry.

  • Duplicates are identified using a strong hash of the serialized form of the selected properties or '.geo' for geometry.

  • The method accepts a property name, a list of property names, or '.geo' as input for comparison.

  • It returns a new FeatureCollection containing only the unique features.

  • The original FeatureCollection remains unchanged.

 Removes duplicates from a collection. Note that duplicates are determined using a strong hash over the serialized form of the selected properties.

UsageReturns
FeatureCollection.distinct(properties)FeatureCollection
ArgumentTypeDetails
this: collectionFeatureCollectionThe input collection from which objects will be selected.
propertiesObjectA property name or a list of property names to use for comparison. The '.geo' property can be included to compare object geometries.

Examples

Code Editor (JavaScript)

// FeatureCollection of power plants in Belgium.
var fc = ee.FeatureCollection('WRI/GPPD/power_plants')
             .filter('country_lg == "Belgium"');
print('FeatureCollection of power plants in Belgium', fc);

// Remove duplicate features according to property values.
print('Distinct based on a single property', fc.distinct('fuel1'));
print('Distinct based on two properties', fc.distinct(['fuel1', 'source']));
print('Distinct based on geometry', fc.distinct('.geo'));

Python setup

See the Python Environment page for information on the Python API and using geemap for interactive development.

import ee
import geemap.core as geemap

Colab (Python)

# FeatureCollection of power plants in Belgium.
fc = ee.FeatureCollection('WRI/GPPD/power_plants').filter(
    'country_lg == "Belgium"')
print('FeatureCollection of power plants in Belgium:', fc.getInfo())

# Remove duplicate features according to property values.
print('Distinct based on a single property:', fc.distinct('fuel1').getInfo())
print('Distinct based on two properties:',
      fc.distinct(['fuel1', 'source']).getInfo())
print('Distinct based on geometry', fc.distinct('.geo').getInfo())