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Did 23 and Me a couple of years ago and very happy with the results, a well-designed site with lots of features and easy to use.
Then saw that Family Tree DNA is running a transfer special. Transferred it over to and the ethnic breakdown is so vague. Searching matches is much harder. The whole site seems to have far less to offer.
Also different results. For instance, the ethnic breakdown on 23 and Me shows 2% specifically Scandinavian and mostly British, which makes sense with what's on paper. Family Tree DNA shows 38% Scandinavian. What a difference!
23andMe has better ethnicity results but I find FTDNA is better for matches. I recently found out that 23andMe does not simply list all your matches who share above 5cM or 7cM with you like FTDNA does. So there's a legit LOT of matches you will never see on your DNA Relatives list. You can find some of them which don't appear on your match list by using the Countries of Ancestry tool - but even that isn't comprehensive. Then there's the fact that in order to do any kind of triangulation, you have to invite people to share their genomes with you - which is at least more than Ancestry.com offers, but many people decline or never respond. Even the ones that do accept, there is then no way to see which ones have matches in common with another except by using a third party Chrome extension tool called 529andYou. But even with that, you have to remember that since 23andMe's match lists are so incomplete, you can wind up sharing the same segment (7cM+) with two people who also share the same segment with each other (once genomes are shared, they can confirm they are a match to each other on that same segment), yet the two others aren't showing up on each other's match list. 23andMe's system of creating a match list is so unreliable, it makes doing any kind of triangulation impossible.
Meanwhile, FTDNA have multiple, built in tools to maximize triangulation and they provide a list of all your matches above a certain amount of shared DNA without any of the erratic results you get with 23andMe. So when it comes to matches, I greatly favor FTDNA and at the moment, I'm really fed up with 23andMe.
23andMe has better ethnicity results but I find FTDNA is better for matches. I recently found out that 23andMe does not simply list all your matches who share above 5cM or 7cM with you like FTDNA does. So there's a legit LOT of matches you will never see on your DNA Relatives list. You can find some of them which don't appear on your match list by using the Countries of Ancestry tool - but even that isn't comprehensive. Then there's the fact that in order to do any kind of triangulation, you have to invite people to share their genomes with you - which is at least more than Ancestry.com offers, but many people decline or never respond. Even the ones that do accept, there is then no way to see which ones have matches in common with another except by using a third party Chrome extension tool called 529andYou. But even with that, you have to remember that since 23andMe's match lists are so incomplete, you can wind up sharing the same segment (7cM+) with two people who also share the same segment with each other (once genomes are shared, they can confirm they are a match to each other on that same segment), yet the two others aren't showing up on each other's match list. 23andMe's system of creating a match list is so unreliable, it makes doing any kind of triangulation impossible.
Meanwhile, FTDNA have multiple, built in tools to maximize triangulation and they provide a list of all your matches above a certain amount of shared DNA without any of the erratic results you get with 23andMe. So when it comes to matches, I greatly favor FTDNA and at the moment, I'm really fed up with 23andMe.
Pretty much +1 on all of that.
23andme has *far* superior ethnicity estimates. FTDNA's (even after they revamped it) are nearly as bad as AncestryDNA's 1.0 (with their 2.0 they are far superior to FTDNA).
With that said I also agree the matching tools on FTDNA are far superior. Especially since it includes a chromosome matching tool... and from within that toll you can download a csv of all your matches and it breaks it down by shared segment, it's great to sort by chromosome, hide the rest, and sort by position and look for overlapping matches (though you have to keep in mind the match could be on the tested persons father or mothers' half of that segment so don't assume an overlapping segment range is a match).
Ancestry DNA's ethnicity results are a bit below 23andme but far above FTDNA, and they seem to have the best West African matching. I *really* wish Ancestry DNA had a chromosome matching tool, if so it would probably the best of all worlds... because Ancestry DNA is *great* for it's tree integration and finding matches with matching trees, including their new-ish Circles feature which really helps lend supporting evidence to a tree if you find many intermatched people also share the ancestor... again if they had chromosome tools they would be the only stop for me really (minus better ethnicity matches on 23andme).
Guess I need to play around with FtDNA matches more and find out what else there is to see or do. Agreed, 23andMe seems to limit matches to just under 1000. I did notice that some people contact me on 23andMe but are not in my DNA Relatives. It can be a real chore to find each other. But that may have to do with choices people make on sharing their info.
It looked like there are more matches and with larger matching segments on FtDNA. I like FtDna's chromosome matching tool. Much easier to compare all matches on it. On 23andMe I'd have to get someone to agree to share even to look at the chromosome match. Weirdly also, some people I'm matching with on both show a lot more matches on FtDNA! (?) Like 23andMe shows one segment matching and FtDNA shows 13 matching segments.
I do think 23andMe's list of matches on DNA Relatives is easier to search though. You can look for matches by surnames, locations or haplogroups easily. And all of that and more is included in the mere $99 fee 23andMe offered at the time. On FtDNA it looks like they want to charge separately for the same things and at substantially higher prices. FtDNA wants $169 for yDna, $99 for Family Finder, $199 for MtDna, and I already got those and more at 23andMe for a grand total of $99.
Looks like there's just not much to the ethnicity breakdown. A map with whatever you call them, "heat" markers. For instance on the Scandinavian one mentioned earlier. Mine is hovering mostly over Norway. I'm wondering if that isn't just a generic marker for Scandinavia and not really custom for my family. Maybe we could have more Swedish or Danish for all we know but the marker just happens to "float" mostly over Norway. Likewise the British Isles marker centers over the UK and has 3 rings outside that include Ireland, but shows highest concentration over England. Generic or custom?
23andme has *far* superior ethnicity estimates. FTDNA's (even after they revamped it) are nearly as bad as AncestryDNA's 1.0 (with their 2.0 they are far superior to FTDNA).
With that said I also agree the matching tools on FTDNA are far superior. Especially since it includes a chromosome matching tool... and from within that toll you can download a csv of all your matches and it breaks it down by shared segment, it's great to sort by chromosome, hide the rest, and sort by position and look for overlapping matches (though you have to keep in mind the match could be on the tested persons father or mothers' half of that segment so don't assume an overlapping segment range is a match).
Ancestry DNA's ethnicity results are a bit below 23andme but far above FTDNA, and they seem to have the best West African matching. I *really* wish Ancestry DNA had a chromosome matching tool, if so it would probably the best of all worlds... because Ancestry DNA is *great* for it's tree integration and finding matches with matching trees, including their new-ish Circles feature which really helps lend supporting evidence to a tree if you find many intermatched people also share the ancestor... again if they had chromosome tools they would be the only stop for me really (minus better ethnicity matches on 23andme).
Yeah, it's like each company has something the others don't, but without all the features from each of them, it's difficult or even impossible to make any head way. If only there was one that had Ancestry.com's tree tools, FTDNA's triangulation tools, and 23andMe's ethnicity tools. Maybe we could actually get something done!
Now that I've tested myself with all three, I can't see me using 23andMe again if I'm going to test other family members. I don't need their ethnicity results, which is the main benefit of 23andMe. While I'm not happy with Ancestry.com's lack of chromosomal browser, they do have the most matches with trees, which is the only way to get anything done, and since you can transfer Ancestry.com's results to FTDNA for a smaller fee than the cost of the test, but not vice versa, it makes the most sense to buy an Ancestry.com test and then upload to FTDNA and Gedmatch.
Looks like there's just not much to the ethnicity breakdown. A map with whatever you call them, "heat" markers. For instance on the Scandinavian one mentioned earlier. Mine is hovering mostly over Norway. I'm wondering if that isn't just a generic marker for Scandinavia and not really custom for my family. Maybe we could have more Swedish or Danish for all we know but the marker just happens to "float" mostly over Norway. Likewise the British Isles marker centers over the UK and has 3 rings outside that include Ireland, but shows highest concentration over England. Generic or custom?
Yes, FTDNA. My original name for this thread was going to be, Now I'm Totally Confused. Just glancing at your blog post I see I'm not the only one with widely different results. I'll take a closer look, thanks for posting.
Yeah, it's like each company has something the others don't, but without all the features from each of them, it's difficult or even impossible to make any head way. If only there was one that had Ancestry.com's tree tools, FTDNA's triangulation tools, and 23andMe's ethnicity tools. Maybe we could actually get something done!
Now that I've tested myself with all three, I can't see me using 23andMe again if I'm going to test other family members. I don't need their ethnicity results, which is the main benefit of 23andMe. While I'm not happy with Ancestry.com's lack of chromosomal browser, they do have the most matches with trees, which is the only way to get anything done, and since you can transfer Ancestry.com's results to FTDNA for a smaller fee than the cost of the test, but not vice versa, it makes the most sense to buy an Ancestry.com test and then upload to FTDNA and Gedmatch.
Completely agreed again. Though I'm having my grandmother DNA tested on 23andme (shes already been tested on AncestryDNA and I imported her over to FTDNA as well), but it's for a *very* specific use case. I had my aunt and mother tested on 23andme (my mother also has been tested on ancestry and imported to FTDNA) and my aunt came up about 0.2% Native American at the standard (75%) confidence level and I'm very curious to see if it comes up on my grandmother (and 23andme seems to be better at picking up Native American), though until I get something more concrete I'm not betting on it. That literally is the only use case I have and can think of to use 23andme again ironically lol, especially since you can't import the latest to FTDNA from 23andme. Anyone else I'm going to test on Ancestry and import to FTDNA.
]On FtDNA it looks like they want to charge separately for the same things and at substantially higher prices. FtDNA wants $169 for yDna, $99 for Family Finder, $199 for MtDna, and I already got those and more at 23andMe for a grand total of $99.
So at first glance it may seem that way... basically 23andme gives you their equivalent of family finder plus your y dna and mtdna haplogroups.
FTDNA mtdna gies you more than just your mtdnahaplogroup, for one you can get increasing levels of analysis for you mtdna haplogroup if you want to pay for it, vs 23andme's single included option. FTDNA also gives you mtDNA based matches, these are people who share a purely maternal line ancestor within a timeframe (usually pretty big), 23andme I believe only matches on your autosomal DNA.
FTDNA Y DNA has many different levels of testing from 25-111 markers and the Big Y test... they range from roughly $100-$600. These give you *much* more than just your Y DNA haplogroup, the more markers you test for the more you can test for fully paternal cousins (people who descend from your same paternal ancestor, most likely following your surname up to either a non-paternal event or before their were surnames). This is *extremely* useful for genealogy... for example I have a 37 marker test currently and I just matched someone of my same surname on all 37 markers, this means there's a 97% chance we share a paternal ancestor within 8 generations. His further ancestor comes from a county in South Carolina about 8 generations back and my suspect furthest ancestor came from that same county, this basically confirms that they were in fact related and we are indeed related stemming from this same area from about 1800. You can also match people that share a paternal ancestor 1,000 years ago, 2,000 years ago etc.
FTDNA includes all the most active surname projects as well where you submit your results to a chart (organized by the admin of the project) that is ordered based on groups that share the same paternal ancestry, you can work with other active members to figure things out.
Additionally you can test for many different markers to dig your haplogroup down much further than what 23andme offers. The Big Y also is a great option, it not only tests commonly known markers that are tied to haplogroups, but millions of regions of markers that may provide further haplogroup exploration. Basically it allows you to contribute data to help discover new sub-clades of haplogroups and further the science of it. I recently ordered one for myself since I likely am the second person in a potential new sub-clade that may be established (one person who I matched on a micro-allele and higher level subclade doesn't match any of the existing markers for the subclade so we both likely are of the same new subclade we'll hopefully help discover).
Basically think of it like this. 23andme's YDNA and mtdna offerings are like the built in stock speakers in a big screen tv you get, they aren't a bad value since they are included, but you can then drop thousands on speaker systems that are in whole new leagues.
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Just glancing at your blog post I see I'm not the only one with widely different results. 
I'll take a closer look, thanks for posting.
