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I've been using Ancestry.com for years and years and have three family trees, one of which is huge. I stopped using this site a while back because it is so expensive. Retired now on a small budget but still love researching and family history. Does anyone know of any free sites to work on a family tree and research? I tried the LDS family tree building site called Pioneers but it is hard to work with. When I entered an ancestor I already had on my old family tree, it would erase my information unless it matched what they have in their database. Any ideas? All help appreciated because I would love to continue this without spending so much. Thanks
Have you considered keeping your trees on a software application on your own PC ? And just use the Internet for research at all the free sites like LDS, etc ?
I use Family Tree Maker (owned by Ancestry). It has a one-time cost of about $70
reed303 beat me to it ... I was also going to suggest some software. The one-time purchase cost is worth it. I'm using an ancient program, Family Origins, because it was given to me. Otherwise I would not hesitate to buy Family Tree Maker. My father uses it.
I'm 99% sure you can download your ancestry files as gedcoms and import them into Family Tree Maker so that you wouldn't have to start from scratch.
reed303 beat me to it ... I was also going to suggest some software. The one-time purchase cost is worth it. I'm using an ancient program, Family Origins, because it was given to me. Otherwise I would not hesitate to buy Family Tree Maker. My father uses it.
I'm 99% sure you can download your ancestry files as gedcoms and import them into Family Tree Maker so that you wouldn't have to start from scratch.
Yes, but you have to have "converted" your Trees to the "New Ancestry" format.
Downloading a gedcom was always possible, even with the old ancestry.com design. They just no longer have instructions for doing so with the old site. It's found in the same location though, under Tree Settings - and you pretty much get to Tree Settings in the same way, it's just that the visuals are a little different.
reed303 beat me to it ... I was also going to suggest some software. The one-time purchase cost is worth it. I'm using an ancient program, Family Origins, because it was given to me. Otherwise I would not hesitate to buy Family Tree Maker. My father uses it.
I'm 99% sure you can download your ancestry files as gedcoms and import them into Family Tree Maker so that you wouldn't have to start from scratch.
Actually, you don't need to download the gedcom - with the latest versions of FTM, it will download your online tree for you and unlike the gedcom download, it will include all your media and all the images of documents you attached from Ancestry.com. Once downloaded into FTM, they will remain on your computer so even if you no longer subscribe to Ancestry.com, you will still have all the records you attached to your tree.
i like familysearch.org better than anchestry and its free.
The OP said they tried FamilySearch.org but had difficulties with it. They have great free collections but they don't even allow you to upload a gedcom, which pretty much excludes anyone who already has a tree and wants to move it to their site.
I use Ancestry in conjunction with FamilySearch. While my Ancestry subscription is no longer active, I use FamilySearch to followup on hints from Ancestry to the best extent that I can; note, this doesn't help when hints are other family trees on Ancestry, which sucks as those are potential golden nuggets of information that I'm missing out on without a subscription. I'll then update my Ancestry family tree with information gleamed from FamilySearch accordingly. Note, even without this process, I'd still be active on Ancestry due to AncestryDNA, which allows me to access new and old DNA hints and to take looks at any shared family names we have in our trees.
Still, as good as FamilySearch is, I would like a cheap/free site that has a better family tree interface. But, I guess beggars can't be choosers.
The OP said they tried FamilySearch.org but had difficulties with it. They have great free collections but they don't even allow you to upload a gedcom, which pretty much excludes anyone who already has a tree and wants to move it to their site.
You can upload a gedcom at Family Search. I uploaded mine months ago.
ETA: (familysearch.org) you click where it says "Family Tree" and it will give you options to upload your gedcom. You have to have an account with them though similar to ancestry.com. Theirs is pretty similar to ancestry.com. I have also used a free online charting website called familyecho.org. You can enter information and share a chart on that site and download/save it in GedCom file for uploading onto Family Tree Maker or Family Search.
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