Family Finder Ancestry & DNA Test, Swab Collection Kit

this will be the 2nd autosomal test ive ordered from family tree dna through amazon. for starters this is also the 5th test total ive ordered from family tree dna too, and overall im disappointed with many opinions and or outright problems people have been having with family tree dna. granted genealogy is one heck of a hard concept to fully understand. my own reasons in particular going with family tree dna was the comprehensive Y testing that you really can't get elsewere witch has really turned a few heads in my family but also confirmed many stories that have been pasted down. autosomal tests ive taken though them though i am inclined to think there is room for improvement or at least more comprehensive results but by no means did i fhave outright outrages in my results. this was a gift btw to further my own research but as far as ease of use and instructions i thought it was pretty straight forward and had no problems with any test ive ordered from them. no botched results, no shipping errors, no missing information. and even had pretty speedy results half the time. my advice is if you have any hesitations or concerns with the amazon reviews id recommend going directly to the website and reading up on them. they really do have an amazing Q and A section on darn near everything you can think of. there are pros and cons with family tree dna for sure like high prices compared to other companies but you cannot find a more comprehensive test on the market as others have said, so just just do your research before deciding. from start to finish on this particular test it took 16 days to be processed. i don't think that is unreasonable at all. i just don't understand all the hate...the only issue ive had in particular was finding many matches but everyday the pool keeps growing so im not worried. this seems to be the only thing ancestry has over family tree dna.

I've done testing with both Ancestry and FTDNA. If you're testing for ethnicity, you probably shouldn't be testing at all. DNA doesn't respect political/national boundaries. There's basically no difference between a German and an Englishmen genetically speaking. For the differences there are, they will be different at different times because of migrations/invasions. Both the Ancestry and FTDNA Family Finder test are autosomal DNA tests which tests chromosomes from both parents. Ancestry is a good choice if you are going to do no further testing. They have the largest DNA database to match upon and their ethnicity calculator comes up with results that most people would expect. FTDNA's recent changes in how they calculate ethnicities has produced strange results because of their reference population choices. You can also download your raw results and import them into FTDNA but Ancestry doesn't allow the opposite. The reason to test with FTDNA is their additional testing products. If you're a male tester, you can do additional Y-DNA testing which only tests the Y-chromosome. This allows the test to reach much further back in time; autosomal testing is only good for about 4-5 generations. FTDNA also keeps your sample for 25 years so it's available for additional testing even if the original test taker isn't. So if you're considering doing any additional DNA testing, FTDNA is your best choice. Ancestry only has the autosomal test. FTDNA's test doesn't require any subscription fees on their site to access other member's trees like Ancestry does. They also have a Chromosome browser to check DNA matches -- Ancestry does not . FTDNA is much more about DNA testing; Ancestry is about their genealogy records. Both will come back with accurate DNA results - ie the raw DNA file. The ethnicity results for both should be looked at with extreme skepticism -- the testing is more suited for determining ancestral matches.

Although I felt like this was a lesser known brand (maybe because other brands are advertised more), I was very pleased with this test. I didn’t realize how popular this testing service actually was in serious genealogy circles. Other services are a bit more commercial, while this one seems to be more in-depth for serious researchers. This test was given to an older relative who was unable to spit in a tube which is needed for other ancestry tests. Instead, this test allows you to swab the tester’s cheek, which made the process much easier to perform on my family member. Although the DNA relatives database seems to be smaller than other companies (meaning the sample pool in which ethnicities are drawn from is not as diverse), this test still gave me insight on my relative’s ethnicity breakdown and y-DNA. I believe this is the basic testing kit, and I know there are other kits that go deeper into y-dna and mtdna, but they come at a much steeper price. Like other companies, you are able to download your raw dna files once they’re available to you. The turn around time for the test was maybe about 2 weeks before I received an email about the ethnicity results. Then maybe 2-3 weeks later, the y-dna results were ready for reviewing as well. FamilyTreeDNA isn’t quite as user-friendly as other ancestry/genealogy DNA testing services, but it wasn’t difficult to learn how to use their website and the information you receive from your results. I did have some difficultly with trying to create a family tree through their service because it said my screen display (on my phone, tablet, and laptop were all too small). From my understanding, it seems like since I’ve done one test already with them, that if I wanted to upgrade to a better y-dna test, I would not have to submit another DNA sample. (I hope to try this in the future.) This is a really great feature because the relative I tested might not be able to give another sample a few months from now. I believe it’s important to note that you can only have one DNA test per account at the time I am writing this review, unlike other websites which allow you to manage multiple DNA results under one account. There is also no app available (as far as I can tell) to use these services or view your results. You have to do it from a web browser. *Make sure you save your kit number somewhere before you send off your results. This is needed every time you log in to your account.

I tested previously with another company, which provides better technical information but useless family genealogical tools. AncestryDNA requires an expensive subscription service to make real use of this product. Be sure to look at the Family Plan for discounted rates for 5 individuals, and keep an eye out for the $1 for 3 month starter subscription! However, Ancestry found 35,000 matches to my DNA. They now offer a feature, ThruLines, which can identify the Most Recent Common Ancestor ("MRCA") between you and a match if there is sufficient family tree to link you *** and that information doesn't have to be from your own family tree ***. My Grandmother's story? Her father looks to be the brother of the man she thought was her father. ThruLines was able to establish an MRCA through the wife of the brother. Ancestry has an interesting feature where they can determine which of the two pairs of each of the 22 autosomal chromosomes belongs to which parent if you can identify to which parent some of your matches are related. It does seem to make mistakes, such as identifying some matches, including the above MRCA, as belonging to my father's side of the family. I still need to delve deeper into my father's side of the family, but I am reasonably satisfied at this point. Ancestry doesn't do mtDNA or Y DNA tests-- and the fact they threw out all the results of these tests in the past, leads me to believe they never will.

A complete rip off. I wish Amazon would enable a zero stars review. It’s been three months since they received my sample and I still dont have the results. Any other service would process this in days or weeks rather than months. It takes several days for the help desk to respond to status requests and when they do it is not helping. And they would not refund the money because I bought this via Amazon and not directly from them. A waste of time and money.

It's hard to understand

Was ready to use and send off.

Among all the DNA ancestry tests, this one was the most detailed, and most reliable. It gave less wrong info like those larger companies do, and it had more scientific data. However, it did have generalized, and some bit of wrong or confusing information. If you truly want to gain some info, this test is the most reliable among all those, I think. But again, what a disappointment for all these companies.

Waiting for results

Es war alles korrekt. Aber das plötzlich noch ein Einfuhrzoll von über zehn Euro zu zahlen war, ist zumindest für deutsche Kunden sehr verwunderlich.

It came quickly easy to do now we just have to see how long it is for the results

I’ve been wanting to know my background and stuff so honestly this is a good start

Kit arrived fast, waiting for DNA results. Several "For Sale" add ons available. By no means is this a 'complete' package.