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Start your family tree with the information you know. Start with yourself and add any relatives whose names you know to your tree. Include all the facts you can find, like birthdays. Add spouses of your biological relatives—this can help you find records for your relatives. If you can, add at least three generations to your tree. This will help you get Ancestry Hints. For help adding people to a tree, see Adding People to a Tree.
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Check out your hints. As you add people to your tree, you'll start to see leaves appearing in your tree. The leaves are hints—records and information from public family trees that may relate to people in your tree. Click on someone in your tree who has a hint, then click the number of hints to see their hints. Accepting hints can add information to your tree and help you get more hints.
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Start searching records. Click on someone in the oldest generation listed in your tree. In the card that appears, click Search. This will populate your search with information you've entered in your tree. To see a certain type of record, click a filter on the left side of the page under All Categories. Census records can be especially useful for building your tree. If you can find a census record where your oldest known relative appears as a child, their parents will likely be listed, and you can add their parents to your tree. For more help searching, see Getting Started, Lesson 5: Search Tips. To search through a specific record collection (like the 1940 census, for example), use the card catalog.
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Take an AncestryDNA test. A DNA test can connect you with relatives and give you an idea where your ancestors may have lived. Take a look at what you can expect with AncestryDNA.