atDNA Matches by Company

I've made this my own "DNA Month"  and plan to concentrate on getting all the things I've learned to  do actually done.  I've got some more gedcoms to upload, some more third-party tools to download and start using, match contacts to reply to, other matches to contact, and lots of results to analyze.

Comparing atDNA test results across companies
Luckily for me, my aunt was gracious and curious enough to let me test her atDNA.  She's the only close relative I have from an earlier generation and so, consequently,  her results are very important in my research.  I tested her with Ancestry.com and then transferred the raw data to FTDNA to facilitate chromosome mapping.  I've also got both of us at GedMatch.

I haven't been paying much attention to my matches beyond 4th cousins.  Making this chart made me realize looking at my aunt's "4th cousin" matches, in essence, gives me one more good generation of priority matches to consider, at least on that side of my family.  And, I didn't realize that she actually has more "4th cousin or closer" matches than I do.  I'm going to have to spend some time on this result!







Hmmm...my chart for our FTDNA matches illustrates some of the differences between the two companies and how they select/report matches. ...  Far fewer matches but more (on the surface) common matches.   Given that my aunt doesn't have the Colonial America ancestry that's a full quarter of my pedigree chart, it surprises me that my aunt has more matches than I do.

It will be interesting to see how all these numbers change over time.