Family Search Website Tips for Beginners

Written by Tiffany on March 27, 2020. Posted in American, Denmark, Norway, Sweden.

Are you or someone in your family brand new to Family Search? Maybe its a youth who wants to add their information onto Family Tree and doesn’t know how. I will show you a few tips about how to understand Family Search from a beginner’s perspective.

family search website tips for beginners, www.savvygenealogy.com

Start by making sure you have a separate email not shared with anyone else in your family. If it’s a child that doesn’t have their own email, then you can use a parent’s email or phone. Do you or your child already have another account with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? If so, then you don’t need to create a separate Family Search account. All you do for that is click on the Sign In button in Family Search and fill in the username and password options. You can recover their username and password if they’ve forgotten them.

4 Steps to Create a Family Search Account

Step 1: Create your free account. The following picture will help you be familiar with this step. If you’re creating an account for a child between 8-12 yrs old, then they must have parental authorization. Family Search will send a separate email to the parent once the child fills out the basic information and the parent has to click the authorize button before the child can make the account.

Step 2: If you’re creating a new account and you or your child is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, then click the checkbox indicating membership. You can then add your membership record number to the box. If you don’t know it, then leave it blank and you can add it later.

Step 3: Enter your username, password, and recovery method. The following picture below will show you how. Once you enter all of the information, then click Create Account.

Step 4: Verify the account. Family Search will send you, or your child if you used a child’s email, a verification email. Open the email and follow the instructions to activate the account. If you didn’t get a verification email, then click Resend and another one will be sent to you. If you end up with more than one email, then use the most recent email to activate your account.

Now you are ready to search for your ancestors on Family Search or go to Family Tree and get started building your family tree. If you need more help with this part of the process, then check out these Family Search tutorials on How to Create an Account for a Child and this one about how to create an account for yourself.

3 Steps to Link to an Existing Family Tree

If you want to start building your family tree or connect to an already existing one. Then click on Family Tree in the top toolbar. It will automatically show you as the first person in a pedigree chart. If you want to connect to an already existing tree, then follow these steps.

Step 1: Instead of working from you to your ancestors, you need to work backwards from your ancestors to you. So click Find in the top menu bar. Type in the name of the direct-line relative closest to you that is deceased. This is usually a grandparent or great-grandparent. Enter in all of their information that you know of. Then click Search. Family Search will pull up possible matches to your search. Click on the closest possible match.

Step 2: Open up your grandparent’s Person Page. Scroll to the bottom where it shows Family Members. Find your mother or father listed among Spouses and Children. If they are NOT listed because they are living, then click Add Child. Once the information is added, then click to open Person.

Step 3: Scroll to the bottom of your mother’s or father’s page. It will list their children in the Family Members section. If you are NOT listed, then click on Add Child and enter your information from your newly created account. Family Search will then attach your new account to your parent’s account.