Jennifer L.

Yes, Ancestry seems expensive and the membership has gradually increased over time. But what do people expect? Their database is massive and growing. It's way better than MyHeritage. I never find much on that site and I've just grown accustomed to Ancestry's layout. I love their throughline guide (not meant to be set in stone), and their hints are helpful (but also not meant to be taken without checking into them on your own). I love that you can build multiple trees (I have many experimental ones to sort out confusion on family lines). I love that you can manage the trees and DNA belonging to your family members. I love that all of the trees and DNA that others share with me are compiled into an easy-to-find and navigate list. I love that no one can change your tree unless you make them manager of it. I love that everything you attach to your tree stays attached, even when you take breaks from paid membership. No, you cannot view those attached things while you are not a paying member, but once you renew your membership, they are all still there and viewable again. This is why you should download them while you are a paid member, save them in your files, and upload them into your tree as photos. Then they will be viewable during unpaid breaks from membership. Ancestry is a huge continuously growing database. New stuff is continuously being added. Their DNA database dominates all autosomal DNA databases thus far (in my opinion). They allow you to upload DNA from other testing companies (which is kind of them). Sure they are a huge corporation that understandably wants to make large sums of money, but based on all of the things they offer that other sites don't, I think it's worth the money. Also, if you remain patient and wait for sales you can save quite a bit. I dapple with other family tree building and research sites, but Ancestry has remained my favorite thus far. Once you learn how to navigate, and what not to do when building and adding to your tree, it is an awesome genealogy tool. When used with sites offering DNA tools (like DNA painter, triangulation, and one-to-many comparison) it's even more beneficial. So yes, they are pricey but to me...they are where I get the most bang for my buck. At least, so far.