Many people have asked, if you're just getting started with GEDmatch, which tools should you be
using? So I'm gonna go over four tools today in the order that you should be using them. Howdy,
welcome to Family History Fanatics, where we love helping you climb your family tree and have fun
along the way. GEDmatch has a lot of tools and can be overwhelming. Now, I've created videos on how
to use lots of the different specific tools. And hopefully, I'll get through all of them this year.
But if you're just getting started with GEDmatch and you want to know
which ones should I be using first? then I'm going to talk about four tools today in the
order that you should be going and using them. Now, the first tool that I want to talk about
is the Are Your Parents Related? So let's go and take a look at where you can find this tool. If we
go over to the GEDmatch page, you can see that the Are Your Parents Related? tool is right here. Now,
why would you want to use this tool? Well, you can watch the video that shows more about this but
in essence, what you want to do is you want to identify whether or not
you're going to have problems sorting your matches. The majority of people
have matches that can be sorted into two columns. Those that are related to your father and those
that are related to your mother. In other words, you inherited that DNA through one of those two
lines. unfortunately for those whose parents are somewhat closely related. Now, this could be
second, third, fourth, fifth cousins where you end up sharing a little bit of DNA that you got from
both your mother and father. Then you may have matches that could be from either one. And you
don't know which one because you got that same DNA from both your mother and your father. But
like I said, the majority of people do not have this problem. You're probably going to come up
with no. They're not related. And then, you know, going forward, that you don't have to worry about
whether they might be in both or if they're one or the other. Now, the next tool after you've figured
out that you don't have any problems or that you maybe do have a problem is the One-to-Many list.
And this is the shared match, or this is the match list. This is the people who match you with DNA.
Now, in GEDmatch, the One-to-Many is a real quick and dirty way to analyze it. So the numbers on
that are not necessarily going to be exactly accurate. But we'll get into that in a second.
What you can do from this list is you can identify those who you are most closely related to. Now,
you can find this tool on GEDmatch, and it's going to be this one right here. There's two of them.
There's the beta, and then there's just the DNA comparison. I would almost always use the beta.
It gives a lot more information, and I think it's organized better. So with this match list. Now,
you're going to be able to start to focus where you want to do your research- which matches you
want to look at. Because, you know, which ones are mostly most closely related to you.
I would typically start with those that are share at least 50 centimorgans or more and strive to
identify who they are and how they're related to you. Once you've exhausted that list, then
you can start to look at some of the others. But this is a good starting point. And it actually is
a segue into the next one. The third tool is the People Who Match Both or One of Two Kits. Now,
I mentioned before that matches usually fall into a maternal side or a paternal side.
Well, this tool is going to help you to start to divide those matches up.
It's a way to sort your matches into groups so. For instance, let's say that you have a cousin
that, you know, that has tested and uploaded their DNA to GEDmatch. If you do a Match Both,
then what you will find is you'll find a list of people that you and your cousin both match.
Now, you happen to know that your cousin is related through your mother because your cousin is
the son of your mother's sister. Well, that means that list that match both of you is all related
through your mother. They're all maternal cousins. So you've already now taken a big group of your
matches and identified them as maternal. You can do this with second cousins, third cousins,
and really anybody that you know how they're related to you. That shared match list tells
you that they're on a certain side of your family tree. When we go over to GEDmatch, we can find the
People Who Match Both or One of Two Kits tool right here. What you want to do then is you
want to start taking those matches from the most closely related to you- from the One-to-Many match
list. And for each one of those closely rated, you want to be running this One or People Who Match
Both of Those Kits. And that way you can see. Well, which ones start to group together. And if
you actually know the relationship of any of those kits, then you can actually assign them. As this
is my maternal or my paternal. Or this is my paternal grandfather or my maternal grandmother.
However, you know, that relationship, you're going to be able to start grouping these and seeing
which DNA matches go together. And now, you're actually able to start to do some research into
these different people. Before we continue, if you want to support us, there are many ways that you
can help out. In the description below are links to our show notes to the blogs to free guides. As
well as information on how to join FHF Xtra. The most important thing you can do is leave a comment
share this video with your friend. And click the like button. We grow thanks to support from
members like you. And with that, you're going to go to the fourth tool once you have a better idea
of how somebody is related to you and maybe some of the other matches that are related to them.
It's time to start looking deeper into this match. This tool is going to give you the details
specific details about that match. So it's not only going to show you how much you match,
but it's going to show you which chromosome you match on. Where that segment is located on that
chromosome. Now, this can be used in conjunction with this group or these groups that you've looked
at. When you look at each one of them, do you see anything in common? For instance, hey, you know,
five of these people all share a segment that is the same in this on this chromosome that
everybody else does. That's an indication that you all received that segment from the same
common ancestor. Now, the bigger the segments are, the more closely related that ancestor might be,
although not always. So that should help get you started. Now, if you want to watch each
one of the videos for these individual tools, then they are in the description below. Start
with they Are Your Parents Related? Then start with. Then go to the match list, the One-to-Many.
With that, we're going to start using the Matches Both Kits to start to group things.
And start looking at each individual one with the One-to-One. If you have any questions, you can put
it in the comments below. Now, if you'd like to just get an overview of GEDmatch, you can watch
this video up here. If you want to learn something else, then you can watch this video down below.