Using Reddit in Your Genealogy Research: Getting Help Online

Reddit genealogy

Reddit has become a powerful place on the web for genealogists, though it remains unknown to many. If you are looking for help with your genealogy research, a brief translation of a record, or identification of someone in a photograph, Reddit may be the place to go for answers.

Reddit is organized into “subreddits,” or pages where users can post questions, photos, and links devoted to a particular topic. Here are a few of the most useful subreddits for genealogists:

Reddit Genealogy Help (General)

  • Genealogy (~24,000 subscribers):
    • Easily the most useful subreddit for genealogists. Post questions, stories, and news here about nearly any topic genealogy related. A number of enthusiastic and capable people follow this subreddit. They generously donate their time and expertise on occasion to help with tricky problems.
  • Ancestry (~2,800 subscribers):
    • This subreddit is devoted to questions/comments about Ancestry.com, but occasionally fields material on genealogy in general.

DNA Help

  • 23andMe (~12,500 subscribers):
    • As the name suggests, is devoted to users of the DNA services provided by 23andMe
  • AncestryDNA (~1,600 subscribers):
    • A forum for questions and discussion about Ancestry.com’s DNA service

Photo Editing and Identification

Old Newspapers

  • Old News (~36,000 subscribers):
    • A subreddit where users share and discuss old news clippings they find online.

Translation Help

  • Translator (~33,300 subscribers):
    • Need help translating something? Post here!

Identifying Objects/Artifacts

  • whatisthisthing (~683,000 subscribers)
    • Pretty self-explanatory. Take a picture of something you have from family and post it here to help figure out what it is. (For example, Grandpa’s French artillery fuse setter is identified in this thread.)
  • Antiques (~16,400 subscribers)

This list is by no means exhaustive. Please don’t hesitate to let me know if you run across a great genealogy subreddit not on this list.

Best of luck to all of you in using Reddit as a tool in your genealogy research in the future!

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