Ancestry.com Reviews 34,309

Ancestry has taken us back through centuries and countries to find relatives we never knew existed. Family secrets have been revealed that would have remained unknown without the research from Ancestry. The customer service has always been spot on in solving problems, which, BTW, seldom occur.

Don't fall for the monthly plans as they are only valid if you commit to paying monthly for six or months. If you decide to cancel your membership before the six months they will charge you a fee for that. For using a digital platform that offers limited human customer service. They will nickel and dime you to death regardless of whether you use the service or not. It'd be interesting to see how much they make off people who simple want to cancel a membership and get charged this fee.

Your prices are expensive so I do not appreciate getting this message

We're sorry, this person's hints information is temporarily unavailable. You can try reloading the page, or come back later.

I come back later and get the exact same message

Reduce your prices if the service is now inadequate

Any time I am confused in Ancestry, about how to do something regarding DNA or other research, I switch over to AncestrySupport and ask Leaf, the AI search engine. I believe this resource is available at any level of membership.
Today, I was wondering how to verify the DNA relationship of a person who is not the person my brother and sister and I are linked to. The person we all match on Thru Lines doesn't really exist. There is definitely a person in that lineage who is a close relative of the one we found, but I'm not sure they are actually our direct relative. Confusing, huh?

So I switched to AncestrySupport and asked Leaf. I was provided with a positive, helpful response of how to work around to find the correct person without disturbing the trees of my brother and sister.

Leaf ROCKS!

Ancestry is easy to use and support options are available, if needed.
They have plans to support individuals as well as family plans.
You can create Family Trees for all branches of your family.

Would give zero star if I could. First, their 'discount' adds around Christmas did not make it clear what was discounted. It was marketed as if it's to get the test done but it was for membership. Second, they take ages to send you a kit and analyse the kit --- in my case they twice said there was not enough spit. I am capable of spitting into a tube up to a line....Fine, mistakes happen, but why charge me for waiting?! They said I could have used the website to trace family. But how am I supposed to that without results? And also I am from Turkey, the website doesn't cover that geography well. It is very difficult to find who to complain to, the human person I chatted was nice but all she could do was to repeat what's on the webiste. So I paid for 6 moths for absolutely ZERO service and hence ZERO stars!

Ancestry makes you pay for a membership

It's already enough that it's constantly changing a person's DNA from what it was. The first time they gave it to you. But at least you could still pretty much build a decent family tree at 1 point, find your ancestors. But now, even to read up on one, you gotta pay. They? That's not cool. Okay? The the newspaper clippings and all that okay, you charged extra for all that. But now, just to, it aint worth it. Ancestry nothing but a money hungry company trying to bleed people for every drop.They can get really

"We are a human centered company with a mission to connect everyone with their past so they can discover, preserve, and share their unique family stories." www ancestry com "We are human centered discover their unique family stories."

The subscriptions' costs at 40% off are too expensive for the segregated resources within the three membership tiers, U.S. Discover; World Explorer and All Access for me.

Ancestry does not tell you is that these memberships are not the end of the tiers. There is a PRO tools tier. These "PRO tools" are utilities that ought to be made available at all membership levels. Instead Ancestry uses the "Tools' to drain more money out of its database contributor/customers.

Another thing that Ancestor does not share is that once your subscription lapses you will no longer be able to view the original Ancestry Sources you researched and saves to each ancestor you supplied to their database/your tree.

These senseless blocks to resources already acquired and pricing tiers challenges the sincerity of their mission to "connect everyone with their past so they can discover, preserve, and share their unique family stories."

Ancestry is a long time, valuable resource for family records. Highly recommended

In general I love Ancestry.Com. My problem comes from the cost. I understand that people are working and need to get paid. But you can't tell me that with all the people using Ancestry.Com that you really need to charge these prices. and Hold documentation hostage unless you pay a monthly fee! I have been using Ancestry.com from the beginning. I have paid the rates, I simply cannot anymore. It's so frustrating, also because Ancestry has basically taken control of most genealogy sites.

I highly recommend Ancestry for their ease of use in navigating through a tree and attaching documents to the tree. The quality of the data available, is very good. The hints are very helpful. I like to combine it with family tree maker for an enhanced book creation and printing capability.

So I first got my DNA done by ancestry.com in 2012. Prior to that, I had my DNA done by national geographic. And the initial DNA I got from ancestry.com matched the DNA that I got from Nat Geo. Ancestry just used a different wording for example. Ancestry initially had me 55% Ashkenazi Jewish.( Nat Geo by the way, is way more accurate because they use my blood and took months to do the test.) Had me with 46% Mediterranean. So what ancestry is calling Ashkenazi Jewish. Is a combination of my Mediterranean DNA, and my Asian and South Pacific DNA which is not being represented by ancestry.com. but initially in 2012 it was. Wail they had me at 55% Ashkenazi Jewish. They also represented my 3% Asian as in Chinese Japanese or Korean. Nat Geo has me at 22% Asian. 19% Pacific islander and 3% Chinese Japanese or Korean. And I want to point out that the original reading of my DNA that ancestry.com did and Nat Geo. Not only looks like me but is connected to my family history. As I am part Asian and Pacific islander Korean to be exact and many Koreans also have some Pacific island DNA. As time went on, ancestry.com started changing my DNA. They changed it at least two times before I just took it down. I actually contacted them and told them that what they're doing with my DNA doesn't resemble the person I am. I am someone that looks part Pacific islander, part Asian, part European and Jewish I look like that. And that's what my family history is. I recently took another test with ancestry.com. Because I had an old test bought years ago that hadn't been used. And again the DNA that they gave me, is actually different form the DNA I took off their site a few years ago. Their explanation is that as they research they update the DNA what's the new information. So now they have me with a bunch of Irish and Scottish DNA. Now I do have some Irish ancestors and family history but not as much as their representing. Let me explain something Irish Scottish and English people, are Celtics. Celtic people are Mediterranean. Celtics migrated from Egypt and Greece. So many Irish Scottish and English people will have a lot of Mediterranean DNA. And for the first time they're trying to claim I have Russian Jewish. That they're calling it Russian Ashkenazi Jewish DNA lol. I absolutely don't have any family history or connection to Russian and they're actually is no such thing as Russian Ashkenazi Jewish DNA. Ashkenazi Jewish means you are German and French Jewish. It means your Jewish people that made it to Europe 2,000 years prior to the Roman conquest of Jerusalem. They went to Europe as traders, and settled in Germany. So they're different from the Jews that were enslaved by the Romans and brought to Europe via slavery and they're different than the Jews flea Muslim persecution in modern times. So what it means to be Ashkenazi Jewish, is your family came to Europe thousands of years ago. I for one have both Ashkenazi safaric, and native American Jews, yeah I know they want to ignore that. But a lot of native Americans have Jewish DNA and so do Hawaiians.
PS my mother is 100% Ashkenazi Jewish. (Her brother is on ancestry as 100% Aeshkenazi Jewish) And my father also has some Jewish,Initially. ancestry had me at 55% Ashkenazi Jewish which makes sense. Now they got me at 40 something this does not make sense.
And by the way, I am also Hawaiian on my dad's side. And I live in Hawaii, and I am a Hawaiian on record. Even my medical records have me as a native Hawaiian. And there's things about me that are different from other people. Like extremely low blood pressure, low heart rate and I breathe slower than other people.because I'm Hawaiian. I have all the other stuff mixed in that I'm talking about but I'm a Hawaiian.

I’ve used Ancestry for about 2 months now hoping to locate biological family. One tip is to search grandaunts and grand uncles then find out who else has their last names. You can message the ones you feel are helpful or if you just want to introduce yourself. It’s a great experience. Give ancestry a try!

Good information

DNA and geographic origins are very good. Suggestions of matches is certainly helpful, as are hints. Expansion of data further into other countries is appreciated. Navigation through tools and aspects of research remains awkward, time consuming, and somewhat non-intuitive. Recent changes to generation of GEDs is very irritating. Apparently, you can only generate zip files but not upload those same files, only unzipped ones - ridiculous! I should have the ability to generate unzipped files. And, when I want to SAVE AS to my PC, it does not show all my drive, only where it wants me to place the file.
Most IMPORTANT to me is the change in process to apparently make generation of trees for printing easier. Now, we can NO LONGER HAVE TWO SPOUSES ATTACHED. In my case and many other users that have contacted me, verbal family history universally incudes Native American heritage that, without DNA, can be traced to an individual. DNA, in my family case, refutes this. Why? Using Ancestry data on ages of spouses and children, I was able to reveal the conflict. My great+ grandfather had two wives. The one we know and shows up in Ancestry was the first wife. The one with N.A. heritage was the second. The birthdates of our ancestors’ children match the first wife. Many Ancestry customers that I know, and others that I do not, insisted that they had N.A. , but eventually told me that this research was correct. THIS WOULD NOW NOT BE ABLE TO BE SHOWN ON THE TREE and much more DIFFICULT TO FIND. Furthermore, I spent a lot of wasted time trying to figure out why I could not add a spouse - no warning, no notice, no explanation. This greatly reduced my opinion of the usefulness, communication, and integrity of Ancestry.com. My enthusiastic support has changed to suggest investigation of several products, unless something is done to restore what was and communicate changes and their ramifications in detail.

David was Very nice and very helpful. Being on a limited budget with Disability Social Security I needed to maintain what allowed me to continue my research. David was very helpful in advising me. Very pleasant and knowledgeable. Enjoyed my time with David very much. Hope he pops up again.

Support staff was friendly and helpful.

He was friendly and knew what he was doing