SHOW NOTES: A comparison of the top three genealogy websites and an update on the latest artificial intelligence news. Lisa interviews genealogy author Sunny Morton about her article “Three’s Company” from the March/April 2025 issue of Family Tree Magazine. They dive into a detailed comparison of the top three genealogy websites—Ancestry.com, FamilySearch.org, and MyHeritage.com—focusing on historical records, DNA tools, family tree features, and more. Sunny shares insights on how these platforms differ, their strengths, and practical tips for genealogists to maximize their research. Whether you’re a U.S.-focused researcher or tracing global roots, this episode has something for everyone.
Listen to Podcast Episode #293
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What Is a Historical Record and Does Its Definition Differ Between the Three Websites?
Timestamp: 00:31
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• Definition: A historical record is a document created in the past, ideally close to the time of the events it describes, offering a more accurate glimpse into history than later recollections.
• Differences: The definition varies slightly across platforms. Ancestry, FamilySearch, and MyHeritage count records differently—sometimes focusing on the primary person (e.g., the deceased on a death certificate) and sometimes including secondary individuals (e.g., parents or witnesses).
• Tip: Don’t assume every “record” is a unique historical document. A single certificate might be counted multiple times if it names several people. Check how each site labels the “primary person” to understand what you’re working with.
How Do the Number of Records Stack Up Across the Three Websites?
Timestamp: 04:43
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• Numbers Overview: Ancestry boasts ~60 billion records, FamilySearch ~66.24 billion (13 billion searchable names + 5 billion+ unindexed images), and MyHeritage ~32 billion.
• Ancestry: Strong U.S. focus; top 20 collections (e.g., city directories, yearbooks, newspapers) make up a third of its total, boosted by AI indexing of recent centuries. Less helpful for pre-1800 research.
• MyHeritage: More global, Euro-centric, with 40% of its total in its top 5 collections (e.g., family trees, newspapers via OldNews.com). Great for non-U.S. research.
• FamilySearch: Truly global, free, and diverse; top 20 collections are less than 20% of its total, plus 500,000+ digitized books. Hard to pin down exact counts due to unindexed images.
• Tip: Focus on “where and when” your ancestors lived. Use Ancestry for U.S. depth, MyHeritage for European roots, and FamilySearch for global coverage or record-loss areas.
What’s Your Elevator Speech for the Primary Strength of Each Website?
Timestamp: 12:50
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• Ancestry: U.S.-centric with vast records—start here for American research, paired with FamilySearch.
• FamilySearch: Free, global focus, no target customer—ideal for international searches and unique collections.
• MyHeritage: Euro-centric, excels in language translation (e.g., German trees)—perfect for non-English records and global connections.
• Tip: Before subscribing, browse each site’s catalog to see if it matches your research area. Combine platforms based on your needs—don’t skip one just because it’s not your “main” focus.
How Do They Stack Up for DNA Research?
Timestamp: 16:30
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• FamilySearch: No DNA tools—focuses on records, not genetics.
• Ancestry & MyHeritage: Both excel at DNA, making complex data accessible. Offer ethnicity estimates (improving over time) and match tools.
Ancestry: Groups matches by common ancestors; recently added shared matches of matches.
MyHeritage: “Theory of Family Relativity” maps person-to-person connections; accepts raw DNA uploads ($29 for advanced tools or free with subscription).
• Tip: Revisit DNA results every 3-6 months for updated ethnicity estimates and new matches. Rotate subscriptions if budget’s tight—your data stays, and hints accumulate.
How Do Their Family Tree Features Compare?
Timestamp: 23:26
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• Ancestry & MyHeritage: Private, individual trees you control—shareable if desired. Multiple trees allowed for testing theories. No source requirement, but tree checkers flag unsourced data.
• FamilySearch: One giant, public, collaborative tree—nothing private for deceased individuals. Emphasizes sources and reason statements to improve accuracy.
• Tip: Use online trees as “bait” for hints, keeping your full research offline in software. Politely ask public tree owners for sources if unsourced data intrigues you.
How Do They Compare for Searchability in Family Trees?
Timestamp: 29:45
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• All Three: Excellent search portals for minimal or detailed queries.
• FamilySearch Bonus: Search its tree even if you don’t contribute—great for harvesting clues about ancestors.
• Tip: Use tree searches strategically to uncover new leads or verify info, even if you’re not building online. Refine searches as trees grow to stay efficient.
How Do They Compare for Photos, Memories, and Stories?
Timestamp: 31:56
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• General: All are works in progress, with best tools on apps (not always ideal for big-screen users). AI-generated life histories check tree completeness.
• MyHeritage: Leads with photo tools (enhancing, colorizing, animating) and “My Stories” for living-generation narratives.
• Tip: Use MyHeritage’s photo animations to engage family—watermarked as AI-generated, they spark curiosity without claiming historical fact.
How Compatible Are They for Syncing with Desktop Software?
Timestamp: 36:28
Key Takeaways and Tips:
• MyHeritage: Free Family Tree Builder syncs with online trees.
• Ancestry: Syncs well with Family Tree Maker (despite separate ownership).
• FamilySearch: RootsMagic and others pull sections of its global tree.
• Tip: Prioritize sync compatibility when choosing a site—check software options before committing to an online tree platform.
All information was to the best of our guest’s knowledge as of the date of recording.
Latest advancements in AU and their application to genealogy research.
Timestamp: 48:11
1. Gemini Updates by Google. o New Features Announcement (March 2025):
Google’s Gemini app rolled out significant updates, available to try for free, with enhanced features for all users and premium options for subscribers.
2.0 Flash Thinking Experimental:
Offers file upload capabilities (crucial for genealogy context), improved reasoning, efficiency, and speed.
Advanced users (subscribers) get a 1-million-token context window, allowing more extensive project interactions.
Free users can test it with a one-month trial of Gemini Advanced.
Deep Research Tool:
Now upgraded with 2.0 Flash Thinking Experimental, it searches and synthesizes web information quickly, producing detailed multi-page reports.
Available globally in 45 languages; free users get limited tries, while advanced users have expanded access.
Shows real-time reasoning, similar to Grok, enhancing transparency in research processes.
Personalization (Experimental):
Integrates with Google apps (starting with search) to tailor responses based on user history, e.g., genealogy-focused search patterns.
Users control personalization settings and can disconnect if desired.
2. Connected Apps Integration
Gemini now connects with Google Calendar, Notes, Tasks, and soon Photos (in English), allowing complex, multi-app requests.
Example: Genealogy applications could involve organizing research notes or creating itineraries from ancestral photo locations.
3. Gems Feature
A new customizable AI tool, free for all Gemini app users, enabling creation of personal AI experts for specific topics (e.g., genealogy).
Users can upload files and set instructions via the Gems Manager on desktop, tailoring it to repetitive research tasks.
Lisa plans to explore this deeply in upcoming premium videos and live streams, emphasizing its potential for genealogists.
4. AI Competition and Future
Gemini is positioned as a competitor to Grok, with features like file uploads and deep research mirroring Grok’s capabilities.
Lisa predicts AI will eventually replace Google search, with ongoing competition determining the leading AI tool.
5. Practical Tips / Getting Started with AI
Try Gemini at gemini.google.com; start with the free version, then consider the one-month trial of Gemini Advanced for full access.
Closing Note: AI tools like Gemini are like “shovels” for genealogists—essential for digging deeper and enhancing research efficiency. Stay tuned for more in-depth explorations in premium content!
Sign up today here. The Genealogy Gems email newsletter is the best way to stay informed about what’s available with your Premium eLearning Membership.
In this episode we cover a plethora of strategies that will give you access to loads of free genealogy records and resources. We cover:
How to follow the path of least resistance to find what you need for your genealogy research.
The best ways to find free genealogy records online.
What you need to know about the genealogy industry that will help you save money.
How you can bee-line your way to the free records that are to be found at each of the big subscription genealogy websites (Ancestry, MyHeritage and FindMyPast).
Two Google secret searches that can help you locate free genealogy resources.
How to search online to find free records offline.
A clever way to get free help with your genealogy brick wall.
Companion Video and Show Notes
This topic comes from my YouTube video series Elevenses with Lisa episode 21. You can find all the free Elevenses with Lisa videos and show notes at https://lisalouisecooke.com/elevenses.
Genealogy Gems Premium Members have exclusive access to the 5-page downloadable show notes handout in the Resources section of the Elevenses with Lisaepisode 21 show notes page here.
Premium Members also have access to all of the archived earlier episodes. To access the Elevenses with Lisa Premium Member archive, log in to your membership at https://genealogygems.com and under in the main menu under Premium go to Premium Videos and click on Elevenses with Lisa.
Elevenses with Lisa Episode 21 – Free Genealogy! Watch the video and read the full show notes here.
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Finding old newspapers from your ancestors’ hometown isn’t always easy. Here’s how to use Chronicling America to identify the newspapers that were in print at the time. Those issues may not be online, so Chronicling America also points you to copies of those...
Elevenses with Lisa Episode 26 Video and Show Notes
Live show air date: September 24, 2020
Join me for Elevenses with Lisa, the online video series where we take a break, visit and learn about genealogy and family history.
Newspaper Navigator is a new free online tool for finding images and photos in old newspapers at Chronicling America. It doesn’t work the way the Library of Congress website works, so in this episode I show you how to navigate the Newspaper Navigator. It’s a fun session that will have you finding new newspaper gems in no time!
About LOC Chronicling America
Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress. It features free digitized historic newspapers spanning 1789-1963.
Newspapers Contain Imagery such as:
Photos
Drawings
Maps
Cartoons
Advertisements
You may not find the newspaper that you need for your research in the Chronicling America digitized collection. In those cases, turn to the US Newspaper Directory. It catalogs newspapers published 1690-present. Click the US Newspaper Directory button on the Chronicling America website to search. The catalog will tell you where known copies of the paper can be accessed.
Uses of Newspaper Images
Most of the old newspapers featured in Chronicling America include images. And because these old images are in the public domain, they are an ideal complement to family histories.
If you are very fortunate you may find photos or images of your ancestors, their homes, or other things specifically about your family.
Newspaper images are also a wonderful source when you need a photo or image to represent an important idea or item when telling your family’s story, whether in a blog post, article, book, video, PowerPoint presentation or other medium. Example of this would include a photograph of a blacksmith shop in the 1890s in the area where your ancestor worked as a blacksmith, or an advertisement for a Sears home kit just like the one your grandfather built.
Chronicling America’s Newspaper Navigator
The Newspaper Navigatordataset currently consists of 1.5 million pieces of extracted visual content from 16,358,041 historic newspaper pages in Chronicling America.
The visual content was identified using an object detection model trained on annotations of World War 1-era Chronicling America pages, made by staff and volunteers.
This “visual content recognition model” detects the following types of content:
Photograph
Illustration
Map
Comics/Cartoon
Editorial Cartoon
Headline
Advertisement
It also includes text corresponding to the imagery, identified by Optical Character Recognition (OCR).
Searching the Newspaper Navigator
You can search all images with captions. The results will be returned in a Gallery view featuring up to 100 images per page. This results format makes it very easy to quicky browse the images.
You can also switch to List view which lists the images along with the text retrieved by OCR.
How to Find Images Faster in Old Newspapers
Run a search in Newspaper Navigator of the word baseball and then run the same search in Chronicling America. A comparison of the results highlights the between Chronicling America and Newspaper Navigator when it comes to finding images in old newspapers.
The search results returned by the Newspaper Navigator are solely focused on photos and images. This means you have a fraction of the number results to review. Another big advantage of Newspaper Navigator over Chronicling America is the size of the image. Newspaper Navigator gives you just the large image to review, while Chronicling America shows you a thumbnail of the entire page with images so small that you must click and load the page to analyze them.
Images appear much smaller at Chronicling America and require you to click through to the page for closer examination.
Start by running a keyword search. (example: Blacksmith). On the results you can filter the results by Location and Years. Because the search currently doesn’t support Boolean operators or other types of search operators, you may need to run a few different versions of the same search to get a complete picture of the potential results. We’ll talk more about search strategies in just a moment.
Once you find an image you want, click to open it. The pop-up box offers these four buttons:
Download Image – Downloads a high-resolution copy to your hard drive.
Cite this – Generates a source citation that is automatically copied to your computer clipboard. Then you can simply paste it as needed. You can also cite the dataset by including the image URL, plus a citation to the website such as “from the Library of Congress, Newspaper Navigatordataset: Extracted Visual Content from Chronicling America.” According to the website, all images are in the public domain and free to use. Learn more about Rights and Reproductions at https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/about/.
Learn about this newspaper – Takes you to the Chronicling America catalog listing for the newspaper from which the image comes.
View Full Issue – Takes you to the complete newspaper issue at the Chronicling America website.
Click the buttons to select the options
My Collection at Newspaper Navigator
You can gather and save collections of the newspaper images you find using Newspaper Navigator. Start by running a search. On the results page click to select the desired images, then click the Save button. This will generate a URL for that collection and copy it to your clipboard. Since Newspaper Navigator doesn’t currently allow you to log in and return to your past searches during different sessions, I suggest pasting the URL into a research log for future reference.
Train My AI Navigators at Newspaper Navigator
A unique feature of the Chronicling America Newspaper Navigator is the ability to “train” the site to search for you. It does this through machine learning.
Elevenses with Lisa Episode 26
How to Train My AI Navigator:
Run a search
Click to select desired images
Click Save to save the collection of images
Click Train My AI Navigators
Newspaper Navigator will deliver a new set of images based on your selected images. On that page, select additional images that you want by clicking toward the top (+) of the image.
Click unwanted images by clicking toward the bottom (-) of the image.
Click to select the images you don’t want the AI Newspaper Navigator to find.
Click Train My AI Navigator again
Continue adding and subtracting images as needed to further train the system
Type a name for this training session in the Name My AI Navigator The saved AI Navigator name will appear in the Select an AI Navigator column
Click Save to generate a URL for this training session and paste into your research log.
Click + New AI Navigator to create a new training session spring boarding from the first
Click Clear & Restart to start a new search
Newspaper Navigator Search Strategies
Newspaper Navigator doesn’t, as of this writing, support Boolean Operators or offer an advanced search field. Here are some strategies that can help you have more success in searching the site:
Don’t use search operators, use variations
Even a space between initials can make a difference.
Each variation has the potential to deliver a different result in newspaper images.
Search Locations
Considering how many variations there can be to a name, when searching for ancestors try searching first on the name of their town or location. If there are still quite a few results, you can then filter to only newspapers from their state. I search the town name first because an article may appear in a newspaper from a different state. In the case of my search for McMinnville, I received a small, manageable results list. Had it been large and included both McMinnville, TN and McMinnville, OR, filtering to just Oregon would be helpful.
Test your search theories
Analyze your results and try variations based on what you are learning about what Newspaper Navigator is focusing on.
Search for word strings
In testing my search theories, I learned that Newspaper Navigator did not do well with multiple words that do not appear right next to each other. Therefore, I tried to find word strings that pertained to my family that I could search for such as the name of a business: Consolidation Coal Company.
Search for Photos
Another interesting search you can run is the word Photo. On the results page filter to the state and years that apply to your research.
Use List View to Find on Page
When dealing with a large number of results, List View can help speed up the review process. List View also displays the text generated by OCR. While not perfect, it can be helpful. Use your computer’s Find on Page feature (control + F on a PC, Command + F on Mac) and type in a keyword such as a surname. This will take you instantly to all occurrences of that word in the text on the page. Click the next page and run it again.
Find images quickly by word search in the List View
Learn More About Machine Learning
In the menu click Data Archaeology to learn more about machine learning and the Newspaper Navigator project.
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Answers to Your Live Chat Questions
One of the advantages of tuning into the live broadcast of each Elevenses with Lisa show is participating in the Live Chat and asking your questions.
Bert asks: Are some newspapers only available for a fee on websites such as Ancestry Lisa’s Answer: Yes, several genealogy websites have exclusive collections of digitized old newspapers. You can usually search or browse the site for free to determine if they have newspapers from the location and time frame that you need before you make a purchase. Here are some of my favorites that I’ve had good success with:
We are compensated if you make a purchase after using our links above (at no additional cost to you.) Thank you for supporting this free show by doing so!
Christine asks: (What is the ) newspaper navigator date range? Lisa’s answer: Here’s a break down of the dates:
Chronicling America covers 1789 – 1963 (digitized newspapers) Newspaper Navigator covers 1900 – 1963 (photos in digitized newspapers) U.S. Newspaper Directory at Chronicling America covers 1690 – present (catalog, only some are digitized and those are part of Chronicling America.)
Rachel asks: I have an ancestor that was in the social pages all the time in our local newspaper in the 1800’s. I thought it would make a great book or video, any ideas on how to showcase them the best? Lisa’s answer: I love both of those ideas and I cover many more in my Premium Membership video Inspiring Ways to Captivate the Non-Genealogists in Your Life. Personally I have found that short photo books and short videos that tell one story are received the best by family members. They both offer opportunities to share and highlight items from newspapers. Learn more about quickly and easily making family history videos by watching Elevenses with Lisa episode 16. And I strongly encourage Premium Members to watch these two videos:
lagomcurt asks: Are local small-town papers included in the collection? Lisa’s answer: Yes.
June asks: When you download it ask what to save as. What is your suggestion? Lisa’s answer: I think you’ll find that JPEG is currently the only option in the Save as Type drop-down menu.
Sharon asks: Does Chronicling America have foreign language newspapers in America? Lisa’s answer: Absolutely! Searching in the language will help retrieve items.
Ohio Waisenfreund newspaper at Chronicling America
Pat asks: Does it have Irish American newspapers? Lisa’s answer: Chronicling America does have Irish American newspapers. If they were published between 1900-1963 then they will be searchable by Newspaper Navigator. I would also recommend searching all newspapers (online and offline) by clicking the U.S. Newspaper Director button at Chronicling America. Then search by ethnicity (Irish) and Material Type (online.) You will find that some are linked to other websites where they can be found online. If you see an image of a newspaper on the catalog page, then you know it is available on Chronicling America in a digital format.
Search for Irish newspapers online at US Newspaper Directory
Mark asks: Can the wash out pictures be enhance with the new MyHeritage Photo with the sharping feature and colorization to make it a better final experience with images? Lisa’s answer: Yes indeed. Because the original quality will be poor and with low dots per inch (dpi) it likely won’t improve the way an original photo would. However enhancing and coloring just takes a few seconds and definitely improves the image. Even better, it often makes the print much more readable. I use it on documents too. Click here to try MyHeritage.
Newspaper photo enhanced and colorized with MyHeritage
Kathy asks: If you do a search in English, will it find the search term(s) in newspapers that were written in German? Lisa’s answer: No. You will need to search in German to pick up on any German text. However, if the image itself is similar, My AI Navigator should pick it up.
Lucinda asks: Who is in your necklace and the photo behind you, Lisa? Lisa’s Answer: It’s my maternal grandmother’s high school graduation photo.
Please Leave a Comment or Question Below
I really want to hear from you. Did you enjoy this episode? Do you have a question? Please leave it below. You can also call and leave a voice mail at (925) 272-4021 and I just may answer it on the show!
Click to select the images you don’t want the AI Newspaper Navigator to find.
