Find Ancestors

Researchers -

How do I view a tree on Ancestry.com?

Is Ancestry.com a better site than this, it just seems to advertise the fact that they can give you access to more records.

Thanks

Martin Hill

To view - public - trees on Ancestry you have to subscribe to the site

What do you mean by ‘better than this’?
The sites have different purposes.

As a member here for 14 years, you must know what this site has to offer. It is primarily for mutual help - Ancestry (and FindMyPast) are sites which provide access to records and the facility to compile one’s tree. Neither site ‘gives’ you anything.

This site does hold records - courtesy of its link to FMP - but members here generally don’t use this site for research.

What are you hoping to achieve?

Hardly any of the helpers on the GR boards use GR for research. It's very limited compared to other sites such as Ancestry or FindMyPast.
GR doesn't have Scottish, Irish, or overseas BMD records - amongst other things.

Ancestry and FMP each offer a 14-day free trial, so give them a try first before committing to a subscription, which costs a lot more than a GR sub, but is worth it if you're doing much research.
BUT if you then decide not to proceed with a subscription to Ancestry or FMP, make sure you cancel the free trial before the 14 days are up, or your sub will be taken automatically.

You can view public trees on Ancestry. You have to have a sub for that - though of course you can see them during your free trial period.
Click "Search" near the top of an Ancestry page, then scroll down the drop-down menu to "Public member trees".

I don't use FMP so can't advise on that , but I'm sure someone else will.

Just my opinion as I use both, as Ericka said the 2 sites have different purposes, and as ArgyllGran said both offer a 14 day free trial. That would be the way to go in my mind, IE try both and then decide. I take Ancestry pretty seriously so am prepared to spend a little bit of money by subscribing to both, but I would also like to say that even with both sites sometimes I hit a brick wall or need clarification and I cant praise the helpers on Genes enough for their help, nothing is too much trouble for them. So it really depends on what you want to do.

Before he joins ancestry Martin needs to consider whether he need .com - the world edition, or whether he needs the local one e.g co.uk. The same goes for FMP.
It might be worth starting with the localised version then trading up if he finds he needs the world edition.

Re Ancestry;

It's the particular package you subscribe to which makes the difference, as well as which national version of Ancestry you join.

Assuming you want an English-speaking version, the different national sites are:
ancestry.co.uk (UK); ancestry.com (US); ancestry.ca (Canada); ancestry.com.au (Australia).

Taking the UK one as an example -
there are three levels of sub, giving you different levels of research ability:

Essentials membership includes access to key UK census records only.
Premium membership includes access to all UK & Ireland records.
Worldwide membership includes access to UK, Ireland & all International records on Ancestry.

The other national sites offer similar alternatives, though you'd need to check on each site to see exactly what's included in each level of membership.

If you're going for Worldwide membership (or similar title on the other sites) it doesn't really matter which site you join as far as records are concerned, as you'll get everything anyway.
In that case it's worth sussing out the cost on each site, as they vary. Look for the cheapest one.

If you are in England you might be able to access Ancestry at your local library in normal times. At the moment some counties will allow library members to access Ancestry on line from home.

Many thanks for your replies, I agree that the researchers on here are excellent and they have helped me a great deal over the years. So far iv not needed to research family out side of the UK but I am finding the searches on GR very limited and so I use the free BDM sites.

I pay the full membership for GR but iv heard that Ancestry gives you more options, although from your comments its more expensive. Iv just had a look at a link that I was sent for Ancestry and it looks impressive I have to say.

So get a 14-day free trial and suss it out. Do the same for FMP

No-one who helps on these boards uses GR for research. Simply not good enough