Free alternatives to Ancestry: what each one is good for.
The best free alternative to Ancestry is FamilySearch, which has a huge free record collection and one shared family tree. WikiTree is another free shared tree, Find a Grave covers cemeteries, USGenWeb has volunteer-run county pages, and Gramps is free software for keeping a tree on your own computer. What none of them replaces is Ancestry's DNA test and matches.
The free ones, side by side.
| Best for | Watch for | |
|---|---|---|
| FamilySearch | Records and a shared tree. 16.93 billion searchable names, by its own count, free to everyone | Anyone can edit the tree. Some record images can only be seen at a FamilySearch center or library |
| WikiTree | One shared tree, built by volunteers who care about sources | You work alongside other people on the same profiles |
| Find a Grave | Cemeteries and burials. Memorials generally include birth, death and burial information | Added by volunteers, so check a date against a record. Ancestry owns it |
| USGenWeb | Local help, county by county, always free | Run by volunteers, so some counties have far more than others |
| Gramps | Keeping your tree private, on your own computer | It's software, not records. You bring what you find |
For records beyond these, see free government records and how to find an old obituary.
When Ancestry is still worth paying for.
- DNA. Its DNA network of over 30 million people has no free match.
- Records you've run out of elsewhere. Try FamilySearch first, then use Ancestry's free trial on the line you're stuck on.
Ancestry also lets you start a tree free. It's the records that take a subscription. See FamilySearch vs Ancestry.
If you already have a tree on Ancestry.
You don't lose it by leaving. The owner of a tree can export it as a GEDCOM file, with or without a subscription, and most family tree programs can open that file. Here are the steps.
Where Ancestral Fire fits.
It isn't another place to build a tree. It reads what's already on FamilySearch with your own sign-in, or a GEDCOM file you bring, and tells you who those people were, with the source behind each fact. It can't sign in to Ancestry. See how it compares, including what it doesn't do.
Or just ask.
Tell Ancestral Fire one name, and it reads your tree, searches FamilySearch Family Tree once you connect it, and tells you what it found, with the source behind each fact. A real answer:
Who was the first in my family to leave Ireland, and what became of him?
Among those with immigration dates recorded, the earliest to leave was your great-grandfather Patrick Kennedy (born about 1823 in Dunganstown, County Wexford), who immigrated to Boston around 1847. He settled in Boston, married Bridget Murphy, worked as a cooper, and died there in 1858 at about age 35.
From the Kennedy family's published tree, asked as John F. Kennedy.
See a whole conversation on How it works, or what it finds in one family: The Kennedy family tree, from Wexford to Dallas.
Keep reading.
- Free government records for family history. The US government puts many family history records online free: the National Archives (including the 1950 census), Bureau of Land Management land patents, the National Park Service's Civil War soldiers database, and the Library of Congress's old newspapers.