Ancestry Reviews

I had to PAY $25 to cancel an active membership. Will never use them again. When trying to cancel the membership, which I thought I did before, was asked why I was canceling. I selected the option of too expensive. Their solution - instead of paying $21.99 a month, they offered me $24 a month.

I am extremely disappointed with my experience using Ancestry. Over six weeks ago, I ordered a DNA kit for $109, received it, and mailed it back as instructed. After waiting well beyond the expected timeframe and repeatedly calling customer support because my results were never loading or showing progress, I was finally told today that my kit was “canceled.” The problem? I was never notified of any cancellation, never received my results, and never received a refund.

Do not do business with Ancestry! You can cancel your subscriptions online and they will still charge you. If you try and cancel again after being charged after your initial cancellation it will only open a blank page. You have to talk with someone to cancel and they will not refund you stating they can’t because it’s a “renewal“. It’s just a scam to try and keep charging you. I recommend you use a different company and make sure they do NOT have any affiliations with Ancestry.

I love Ancestry.com. I've been a member on and off for many years now and have collected a lot of interesting information about my family, and I have a lot more to still discover. I just have one small issue with payment options. I am not always able to purchase a membership every month, and I get Visa gift cards for Christmas or my birthday, and I would love to be able to just use the gift card rather than use my bank card, then having to use the gift card for groceries. My understanding is this: they need the card to recharge for the next month's automatic payment, and a gift card generally doesn't have enough money on it for that. My suggestion to them is add a payment option that, if using a Visa gift card, then a second card (a bank card) needs to be added, so that they can then charge that card for the next automatic payment.

Order a kit from Ancestry still waiting for the kit. Talked to customer support yesterday, was easier to talk to my 2-year-old. Tried to chat with a support person, you need to get through the AI chat, then get told we are closed. If we ever get this package I WILL NOT ORDER OR DO ANYTHING with this site.

Do I think it's a scam because both my parents did the DNA test and I have DNA from places they don't have. And the results keep changing, adding new heritages and percentages. It's changed like 5 times for me alone

What I find disturbing is I filled in both parents' names, their parents, aunts, uncles and got a response no such persons.. but for more money and a expensive membership they would look further.. Funny how more money would have found myself and my ancestors.. Shame on you..

Company is a complete scam, took my money and immediately ignored me. Tried to get a hold of them every single day for a week to cancel sale and they completely ignored me. Never sent me any items whatsoever after over a week. They denied my canceling and shipped item anyways late, refused to speak to me, no product, no customer service, stole my money. Avoid at all cost.

Ancestry.com has resorted to baiting customers for a "free trial" and then charging not just a $25 subscription for a month if you happen to forget and slip past the trial period before you cancel, but then when you cancel, they auto bill you for another $25 cancellation fee!! $50 for checking their site out for 5 minutes! No integrity in this business! Profiting off of the unsuspecting customers. Avoid their free trial bait. Don't do business with companies that find more ways to suck you in while they rake in your hard earned money!

Ancestry.com repopulates billing information fields in the account after cancellation and after manual removal. Months pass without charge then erroneous charges are made. Ancestry will wait 90 days to resolve refund. Very poor customer service.

I was sent a reminder on October 21, 2025 that my membership would renew on November 21, 2025. I know my plan was to cancel or put my membership on hold. Unfortunately I did not keep records of that and a month later my account was automatically renewed. Do you think that maybe on November 15 or something close to my renewal date that I could have been sent an email reminding me of this? I think a month is too long for a reminder. I find this unacceptable and unfair business practice, especially for seniors who struggle to keep up with things like this. I will no longer be using Ancestry and will never recommend it to anyone. Sad practice.

It is like they don't want your money and they make everything hard for no reason. Like customers are horrible people, I guess? Their membership program is a nightmare. Pray you never have to contact their support in any way.

Ancestry is scamming old users out of their own work or what they already paid for. I spend over a decade filling gaps that Ancestry could not! I found my ancestry back to the year 0! All those great-grandparents' link now have been removed and hidden behind a paywall. Ancestry didn't do the work, I did. And I paid many times to add to those files. I gifted them the work of hundreds of family lines that their US-centric records refused to complete. Now, I can't find my ancestors through my tree: many are cut short or their relation to me removed. I used to come back and pay for a few months to help add, and this is what I got for it. DO NOT PAY ANCESTRY a dollar!!! They are charging you to do the work and then steal it!

I made the mistake of upgrading my subscription to PRO. At first, it was so satisfying to edit duplicates and to delete extraneous people. Several months later, I am STILL merging the SAME duplicates, day after day. I am STILL deleting the SAME non-relatives, day after day.

This site used to be a great family tree site. Now it's next to impossible to find marriage records... birth records. The price to navigate the mud puddle of sites is stupidly high. Really disappointed because this used to be the go to for family tree building. The records are incomplete.. redacted, and the whole thing feels scammy. Knock it off Ancestry.

They're good on data from well back. The charges they make every month and then if you cancel your membership they charge you $25.99. It’s not worth $21.99 a month than cancellation. They are out of their minds if people can afford that.

Please be mindful of Ancestry.com's less than moral business practices in regard to billing and cancelation fees. This is an organization that has "early termination" fees in their terms and conditions. These fees are in the $30 USD range. Be mindful of their interface as it is designed to promote unintended purchases.

They are a money pit. Don't get this service. They will charge a fortune to get to see your grandma picture. I think this service is just for business. I paid and I sent my swap test to get my zone results, and after that, I was unable to see anything in their website. They are money ridden as its best. They want me to pay More and More and More, and More and More.

I've been a member of Ancestry.com for years. For the most part I've enjoyed their product but the cancellation of their monthly membership is atrocious. They build their membership subscription service on the premise that you will forgot to cancel your subscription so that the automatic billing will kick in. To ensure that I am not billed, when I sign up for the monthly subscription, I immediately cancel it so I don't have the automatic renewal.

My main complaint is that all I ever got from them is many alerts saying we may have found a 4th cousin. What am I supposed to do with that? Should I contact my maybe 4th cousin and try to sort that out myself? I mean, what am I paying for?

I was charged $40.10 by them and went to dispute it and they are telling me they can't find any record of the transaction.... How? They also charge you for canceling your membership which is ridiculous.

Ancestry website does not save inputs. If I say a person is dead, Ancestry changes them to living. That's not right for a genealogy program. If I click on the website and it says confirmed then I believe my input was done correctly, but on Ancestry they change your saved inputs.

I got Ancestry as a birthday gift. I went through the steps and all the data questions. Got very little information without paying more $. Then a year later I got charged 100 dollars for a membership fee, that I didn’t agree to. Total scam that I would never recommend to anyone.

I have been a member since 2000. Love their records, BUT. LDS records are free but mostly not indexed. DNA has been a godsend as we have unraveled mysteries of over 25 years. Why am I upset? Glad you asked! Customer service or lack there of. Philippines? India? Caribbean? Who knows. Maybe China. I get so tired of trying to interpret their quasi English. You ask for an American and it’s always “we can’t do that!”

The human chat was as much help as the AI chat. However, it’s not the reps fault that the company scams its customers. I thought Ancestry was a reputable company but my mind has changed. I was charged $99.95 on two accounts today for a service I will never use. Almost $200 of hard earned money just disappeared. Ancestry knows the scam they run — charge for 3-months instead of one so the customer doesn’t even get a bit of a warning that they made a mistake. Then allow them no way to fix their minor error. It’s gross! Ancestry should be ashamed of themselves.

Any problem is sent to a phone bank outside the USA. There are no phone numbers that link to an office in the US and there is no email to connect with Ancestry for help. Today, their call bank did not resolve my problem. Mid June I cancelled my subscription. I called upon seeing a charge on my credit card statement showing a charge of $42.55. I told him I had canceled it and wanted a refund for the charge that appeared on my card. He stated I may have cancelled the subscription and he believed I did and he would help me, no worries, to cancel the subscription and check on a refund. He canceled the subscription and sent an email confirming the cancellation. Then he put me on hold saying, no worries, let me ask about the refund. He returned and said policy does not allow for a refund and I had until 8/28/2025 to use the service.

I signed up for a 6 month membership and was recently charged for an additional 6 months without notifying me the renewal was approaching. I only realized the charge was pending when I reviewed my credit card activity. I immediately went to the Ancestry website and canceled my subscription but the cancellation date is now in 6 months. This renewal process is very deceptive. I feel Ancestry intentionally declines to notify customers of their renewal date, so they can continue to receive payments. I will never subscribe the Ancestry again.

Stole my money after cancelling my membership three times. Don’t go through this company. They will rip you off. Terrible company. Terrible customer service and if I was you I’d go elsewhere if I was you.

I cancelled my subscription but months later it auto renews. The company offers no help even when proof of cancellation. They have some very tricky and predatory terms when it comes to their agreement. Basically if for any reason Ancestry makes a mistake it’s still your fault and you pay.

Tried the free trial of the “world explorer membership”. Only used it for one day and was unsatisfied when I learned that you have to pay for more memberships on separate websites to access related articles or images. Thought I had cancelled but apparently I didn’t and was automatically charged $42.79 for another month of getting no extra information. Called to ask for a refund a day later only to find out that those are non-refundable. Which as a very large company I’m sure you can see that my account has been inactive and unused since the first day of my free trial, I don’t see why I wouldn’t be eligible for a refund. My email was never even verified. On top of that, I find out they also charge a “early cancellation” fee of $25. A scam all the way around.

Very Simple, would not honor price of $69 for 2 DNA kits. I have had previous experience, they are predatory in their billing, just look at other reviews. Customer Service is nonexistent, There is some good info on website, however read the fine print, know what you are getting into.

I can't believe Ancestry disclosed all my information to the public, Now people are applying for credit under my name, now am fighting with credit reporting companies. DON'T not IT!!! I've asked to have it removed 20 times.

They really get you. Fine print says if they charge you for 3 months and you miss cancelling by even one day they won't pro rate, they make you pay for 3 months regardless and then claim on the fine print if you don't cancel on the day it renews, and try to do it the next day when your credit card is charged, it's too late. BEWARE consumers!

It raised more questions than it answered! While DNA matching distant cousins it did NOT match relatives with same last names despite having many, many, many members with one of my four surnames. It’s only DNA matches from those who test thru them.

Website Doesn't Work - Customer Service No Help. Submitted the DNA kit - tried to build a family tree on their website - kept saying something is wrong, try again later. Called their customer service phone number - nothing worked. Rep asked too many personal questions, I stopped the call. I'm deleting my account - I don't recommend using Ancestry.com

I couldn’t tell you about the product because I can’t get it! Ordered x3 kits (for my husband, myself and Mom) on 12/6/24. I waited 2 weeks with the status on the tracking info showing “arrived at USPS facility” for 3 days so with difficulty finding their actual contact phone number. A representative said my new “replacement kits” would be sent out immediately and now I’m seeing the same thing after a week with it “arrived at usps facility” for the last x3 days, again, saying it will show up by 9 pm the day I look at the tracking information, and everyday it never shows up. Arriving by the end of day as a matter a fact. Whether the product or service is good, gets a big fat 0 for frustration in waiting for it to arrive.

I have had the worst experience with Ancestry, on top of multiple data breach with no actions, they also seem to share data with third party brokers. I suddenly got lots of junk calls after signing up. They also charged my card every month without any email confirmation or my authorization, and they refuse to refund me. If you do cancel, they will even charge a cancellation fee. Do not fall into this company's scam.

Ancestry signs you up for memberships without approval. My mother has an account and gifted me a DNA kit. When the kit was lost I called to get a replacement. They charged me 9.95 for shipping and we completed the call. 3 weeks later I get charged with a membership fee. I never signed up for anything. When I called I was routed to the ** and an agent that did not listen or understand why I called. My recommendation is use another DNA service. The agents in the ** sign you up without permission, probably to get a bonus for signups. I refuse to use any company that outsources to other countries that literally don't have a clue and don't know how to listen. I'm forced to give them a star to leave a review. I would prefer to leave them -5 stars.

I really wanted Ancestry.com. This is service I would have chosen but the membership with auto renewal is nonsense! Ancestry is just taking advantage of people for little in return. There is no need for a membership. We should have paid for all that info with the initial pricing upfront. Consumer beware! Shame on you Ancestry!