What’s New with AncestryDNA and MyHeritage DNA – An Interview with Diahan Southard

Summary

Family Tree Magazine Podcast:

Episode Title: What’s New with AncestryDNA and MyHeritage DNA – An Interview with Diahan Southard
Host: Lisa Louise Cook
Guest: Diahan Southard, "Your DNA Guide"
Date: April 15, 2025

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into the latest updates from two of the biggest names in DNA testing—AncestryDNA and MyHeritage DNA. Host Lisa Louise Cook chats with expert Diahan Southard about what these new features and changes mean for everyday family historians. The discussion provides a friendly, insightful breakdown of evolving ethnicity estimates, the science behind the updates, practical advice for interpreting results, and under-the-radar features listeners should explore.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why Do DNA Results Change and What’s Actually Happening?

[01:43–04:11]

• Diahan Southard: Companies regularly update their DNA databases and algorithms, particularly reference populations (groups of people whom your DNA is compared against).
  • “In the very, very early days…we were getting autosomal ethnicity results in three categories… African, Asian or European. And we were like, oh my gosh, that’s so amazing ... now we have hundreds of populations.” (03:07)
• Updates can suddenly make results more specific—e.g., “Irish roots” may appear more “Scottish” after an update.
• As databases grow and add more diverse samples from around the world, companies can more accurately pinpoint your origins.
• Early results were rough estimates because reference populations were limited. Now, with hundreds added, results get finer and more geographically precise.

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2. AncestryDNA's Big 2024 Update

[04:11–05:49]

• In Fall 2024, Ancestry completely revamped its ethnicity reporting:

  • Changed terminology: “Ethnicity Estimates” are now “Your Origins”; “Ethnic Groups” are “Regions”; “Communities” are “Journeys.”
    • “They used to call them ethnicity estimates and now they’re called your origins...” (04:32, C)
  • Overhauled their website interface and language.
  • Major expansion in reference populations, crucially with 64 new African groups, helping to address underrepresentation.
    • “One of the most exciting things was to see that they added 64 ethnic groups in Africa… making significant progress to make these databases more global...” (05:34, C)

• How do they get new samples?

  • Mostly from customers (including immigrants) who consent to research use, sometimes through direct sampling in other countries.

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3. MyHeritage DNA’s Ethnicity Estimate Update 2.5

[06:55–09:43]

• Released February 2025 after community beta testing and several months refining.
  • “By essentially crowdsourcing their quality assurance process, they were able to spot some bugs... and just step back from their launch and say…this isn’t ready.” (07:28, C)
• Big improvements:
  • Scandinavian category split: Now shows Swedish, Danish, or Norwegian, instead of one broad “Scandinavian.”
    • “My big Scandinavian category has now been reduced to the Swedish and Danish that actually represent my family history, which was really neat to see.” (08:30, C)
  • Deep dive into Jewish heritage: Now 15 Jewish subpopulations distinguished—far beyond just Ashkenazi or Sephardic.
    • “At MyHeritage, they are recognizing the diversity of the Jewish population and allowing them to hone in and narrow down much more specific estimates.” (09:09, C)

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4. How to Interpret Changing Results and Make the Most of DNA Testing

[09:43–11:33]

• Advice for surprises in new results:

  • Test at multiple companies for comparison: Each has unique methods/reference data, so overlaps reveal the most reliable info.
    • “By comparing your ethnicity estimates across multiple companies, you’re going to see… things that are consistent… which is going to allow you to feel a lot of confidence...” (10:13, C)
  • Some companies have specialties: E.g., MyHeritage for Jewish heritage details.
  • Test relatives as well: Siblings only share 50% of DNA; their results can fill in critical gaps.

• How to participate at multiple companies for less:

  • Test at Ancestry, then upload raw data for free to MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA, Living DNA.
  • To unlock ethnicity features (at MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA), pay a small fee ($29 at MyHeritage).
    • “I think it’s 100% worth it at MyHeritage to do that because they do have such a robust ethnicity product.” (11:54, C)

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5. Don’t Miss These Features!

[12:09–15:39]

• Diahan’s Favorite New Features:
  • MyHeritage:
    • Ancient Origins and especially the Genetic Distance Map (visualizes your closeness to global populations; illustrates “clustering” that’s central to genetic genealogy).
      • “What it does is it shows you this visual of how essentially genetically close you are to these different European, Asian, African populations...” (13:10, C)
  • Ancestry:
    • The interactive Journeys migration timeline maps, helping visualize ancestral migration routes over the last 200–300 years.
      • “It’s like a timeline of your journeys… you can scroll through each journey and see that migration path... a really helpful tool for genealogy.” (14:32, C)

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6. Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “I know it can be really confusing … you’re just getting used to one set of results and then things are, you know, quote, updated and now they look completely different. And it can be a little undermining even to our confidence in these results, but it shouldn’t be, and here’s why…” – Diahan Southard [02:03]
• “That massive, kind of nebulous Scandinavian population … is now broken down into the Swedish, Danish or Norwegian categories, which for me were extremely accurate.” – Diahan Southard [08:25]
• “So, by comparing your ethnicity estimates across multiple companies, you’re going to see kind of the cream rise to the top.” – Diahan Southard [10:07]
• “It’s a really helpful tool for genealogy … If I knew my ancestor was in Texas, but I wasn’t sure where they were before that, I could look at this map and see that this particular line was in Texas, and then it was in Kentucky, and then it was in the Carolinas.” – Diahan Southard [14:50]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 01:43–04:11 – Science behind ethnicity updates/differences in results
• 04:11–05:49 – AncestryDNA’s Fall 2024 overhaul: new language, interface, 64 new African ethnicities
• 06:55–09:43 – MyHeritage DNA’s “version 2.5” update: process, crowdsourcing, improved Jewish and Scandinavian results
• 09:43–11:33 – Advice on handling unexpected changes and using multiple test sites
• 12:28–14:50 – Underrated/new features: Ancient Origins at MyHeritage, Journeys migration map at Ancestry

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Additional Resources and Where to Find Guests

• Diahan Southard: YourDNAGuide.com
• Lisa Louise Cook: GenealogyGems.com
• Learn more: FamilyTreeMagazine.com/podcast

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Transcript

[A]

One of Family Tree Magazine's Best of 2024 is Genealogy software called Goldie Mae. It can help you speed up your research, untangle your family tree, and stay organized. It even has an automatic research log. It does not replace your genealogy programs, but it might replace the sticky notes on your monitor and papers on your desk, all those places you keep your notes and figure out your research.

[B]

There's lots to do for free or.

[A]

You can get a discounted [e-mail] FamilyTreeMagaz GoldieMay.com FamilyTreeMagazine welcome to Family Tree magazine's Best Websites podcast. This is the podcast devoted to finding the best websites to help you with your genealogy research. I'm Lisa Louise Cook.

[B]

Today we are zeroing in on two heavyweights in the genealogy world, Ancestry.com and MyHeritage.com now, these sites have been making waves with their latest genetic genealogy updates. Ancestry DNA rolled out refined ethnicity results in, I think, fall of 2024, while MyHeritage DNA upped the ante with their own enhancements in February of this year. So what do these updates mean for you and your family history research? To help us unpack it all, we are joined by an expert who's no stranger to decoding DNA. Diane Southard, your DNA guide is here. Welcome to podcast, Diane.

[C]

Excellent. Thank you for having me, Lisa. I'm super excited to talk about these ethnicity results. They're always a hot topic.

[B]

We're always excited to see them come out. You know, these updates often kind of come with fancy new algorithms and bigger reference populations. But can you break it down for us for the, in the non scientist speak, what's actually happening behind the scenes that make our Irish roots all of a sudden look more Scottish?

[C]

Right. I know it can be really confusing and a little bit disconnect even when, you know, you're just getting used to one set of results and then things are, you know, quote, updated and now they look completely different. And it can be a little undermining even to our confidence in these results, but it shouldn't be, and here's why. So, as you mentioned, one of the biggest things that our companies are doing is they're refining their reference populations. So these are the people that they compare you against. So in the very, very early days, like back in 2007, when we were first doing Odyssey DNA testing, we were getting autosomal ethnicity results in three categories. They could tell you if you were African, Asian or European. And we were like, oh, my gosh, that's so Amazing. I can't believe they know this. Right. And since then, obviously things have been significantly updated and now we have hundreds of populations that our companies are able to compare us against. So it is a big deal to see an increase in these reference populations. It means that our companies have gone into many times into these actual places and have obtained samples from people actually living in these areas, usually people who have fairly deep family trees within these populations. And so you can think of it like, let's say that your family is from a small town in Belgium. And so when you have your initial DNA test results, maybe five years ago, none of our companies probably had Belgian reference populations. And so they couldn't tell you you were from there. So instead they told you something else because they're not going to say, oh, Lisa, we don't know where you're from, because that would be a bad product. And so they tell you something else, something close. They, they assign you, they estimate your closest reference population. And then as they move forward and they refine their results, perhaps they do add some Belgian populations and they're able to more specifically define where you're from.

[B]

That totally makes sense. Well, let's take a look specifically first with ancestry DNA, because their update, most recent update, came out first back in the fall of 2024. What happened there and what stood out most to you with that update?

[C]

Man, Lisa, they overhauled everything, really, as a speaker and a teacher. Like we have products that specifically teach you how to use ancestry DNA. And we had to redo everything because everything changed, the interface changed, even the language they were using changed. They used to call them ethnicity estimates and now they're called your origins. They used to refer to the large, deep rooted locations as just your ethnic groups, and now they're referring to them as your regions. They used to refer to the smaller groups you were part of as your communities, and now they're called journeys. So they changed a lot of the language and definitely the way the website looks, but they also added a lot of content. So they added those reference populations for many, many, many more populations. And then they also added additional of these journeys, which are these migration patterns that allow you to trace relatively recent ancestral heritage. I think one of the most exciting things was to see that they added 64 ethnic groups in Africa. So this has been a really underrepresented population group within our databases. And to see our testing companies making significant progress to make these databases more global is really exciting.

[B]

So are they literally going into those countries and saying, hey, can we test with, have you test with us?

[C]

In some cases, yes. But more often than not, it has been, you know, recent immigration into, you know, Canada, the US and people have just tested and have allowed their DNA results to be part of the research program at Ancestry. And so Ancestry is able essentially to get information from their own customers that increases the value of their product.

[B]

Wow, those are some big changes. I could see how company by company, if you can control the language. Right. You kind of control the whole environment. That makes it a little challenging for the users when you. The same thing might be referred to in different ways. Right. Between companies.

[C]

Definitely, definitely. So I can appreciate the need that a company has to, you know, specifically describe what they're trying to give to you. But also they feel this need to, you know, be unique and kind of fancy. And it's like, oh, come on, just tell it like it is.

[B]

Well, let's talk about MyHeritage DNA.

[A]

Then.

[B]

They had an ethnicity estimate, version 2.5. That update was announced recently, February of 2025. It was a bit of a bumpy road for them to get that update out, wasn't it?

[C]

It really was. As you know, a member of the kind of. MyHeritage has a group called MyHeritage Friends, which are members like you and me, of the community. And we are able to kind of get these sneak peeks at their products, and it's a wonderful program for us. I'm sure you agree, as educators that we have kind of a little advance notice so we can prepare and help people better understand things that are rolling out. And so we had heard, you know, last year that this was on its way, and some of us did receive an initial update. One of the things that's great about myheritage is that they're really great at taking feedback. And a bunch of us were like, hold up. This doesn't make sense. And this doesn't appear to be right. And so by essentially crowdsourcing their quality assurance process, they were able to spot some bugs in. In their algorithm and. And just step back from their launch and say, you know what? This. This isn't ready. And they spent several months refining and making their ethnicity estimates better. And so, yeah, it was a little disappointing as we were, like, all ready to go. And then it took much longer to come out. But I think the end product has been successful.

[B]

Yeah, I agree. It's really nice as a participant in that Friends program to see things ahead, but I really appreciate that they do crowdsource it. They do go to the actual users and people with like, you, with expertise in this area and really solicit your input. So what did they end up with? Give us kind of an overview of what the MyHeritage update was all about.

[C]

So a couple of things that I was really excited by. Number one, for those of us with European heritage, they took that massive, kind of nebulous Scandinavian population, and it's now been broken down into the Swedish, Danish or Norwegian categories, which for me were extremely accurate because, yes, my big Scandinavian category has now been reduced to the Swedish and Danish that actually represent my family history, which was really neat to see. And Another thing that MyHeritage has always been known for, but they kind of went above and beyond with this update, is they are known for their ability to define different Jewish populations, and they have upped that to now 15 different Jewish populations. So at our other companies, most of them are only reporting Ashkenazi, but some. Some will do maybe a little Sephardic in there, but that's it. Where at MyHeritage, they are recognizing the diversity of the Jewish population and allowing them to kind of hone in and narrow down much more specific estimates.

[B]

Oh, fantastic. So we're all going into these programs and looking at our results, and with the updates, we're going to see some changes. What kind of advice do you give people for someone whose ethnicity results really took an unexpected turn? How do people deal with that?

[C]

I think one of the best ways to handle it is to test at multiple companies, because each company does have their own, you know, proprietary algorithms. They have their own reference populations. And so what I found is that by comparing your ethnicity estimates across multiple companies, you're going to see kind of the cream rise to the top. You're going to see things that are consistent across companies, which is going to allow you to feel a lot of confidence in those particular estimates. And you may understand that some companies have a kind of a corner on a particular market, like the Jewish, for example. You just aren't going to see Jewish results like you do at MyHeritage, like you do at other companies. And so understanding kind of the nuances of each database is going to be helpful for you to see where one company may be stronger than another. And so I think it's just kind of that global picture that will allow you to have a better understanding overall of. Of who you are and where you came from. In addition to that, testing multiple family members is going to help you. So you and your siblings only share 50% of your DNA. So if you're really trying to figure out your heritage, where your family members have come from, you alone are not enough. You're going to need to solicit the results of your siblings in order to have a more full picture of your family heritage.

[B]

Interesting. It's true, is it not, that you can upload your raw data? If you tested at Ancestry, you could upload your raw data at MyHeritage. Tell us how people can participate in multiple websites, Right?

[C]

So the most cost effective way to access all websites is to test first at Ancestry, and then you can transfer for free into MyHeritage, Family Tree DNA and Living DNA. So then for the price of one test, you're in all four databases. However, if you want to have access to the ethnicity results at MyHeritage, you will have to pay the $29 unlock fee. Similar price at Family Tree DNA to unlock those ethnicity results. I think it's 100% worth it at MyHeritage to do that because they do have such a robust ethnicity product.

[B]

So, looking ahead, these updates are giving us sharper tools to explore our past. Is there one underrated feature or feature of note either at ancestry DNA or myheritage DNAs with their latest release that you think that our listeners should really jump on?

[C]

Yeah, I'm going to give you one for each because I don't like to choose favorites. Okay. So at MyHeritage, one of the things that they recently released just a couple of weeks ago, is this idea of Ancient origins. And I actually had someone ask me at rootstech at my booth, hey, is this, you know, ancient origins feature going to help me find my great grandfather? And I was like, no, it won't. And yet there is something really interesting about the way that they have displayed your Ancient origins results. There's a lot of really interesting scientific information that you can scroll through within that Ancient Origins. One of the things that I like the most, it's called the genetic distance map within your Ancient Origins. And what it does is it shows you this visual of how essentially genetically close you are to these different European, Asian, African populations. And you can, like, see with your own eyes this clustering effect of the genetics. And I think it's really fascinating, and it really solidifies what we're doing really, overall in genetic genealogy, which is to look for these clusters of people that are more closely related to each other than they are to other populations. So while the Ancient Origins is talking about groups that are thousands and thousands of years old, the same principle applies to you and your own family history. So I Just really love how they have really given us an insider's look into the science behind that Ancient Origins product. And it's really fun to review. So Ancient Origins, the genetic distance map at MyHeritage and then at Ancestry, when they redid their whole website, one of the interactive parts now is to be able to look at the migration patterns. Patterns. It's like a timeline of your journeys. So your journeys, again, represent locations where your ancestors may have been in the last two to 300 years. And you can really scroll through each journey and see that migration path. So I was just reviewing one today for one of my ancestral lines. And I can see that, you know, in the 1700s, they're back in essentially Great Britain. All over but Great Britain. And then you see they all come to, like, North Carolina, Virginia area. And then, you know, by 18, most of them. And you can see this all in the interactive map. You can see most of them have moved to either Tennessee, Kentucky area. And then if we Fast forward another 50 years, this particular migration, they went to Texas. And it's fascinating because this is the path that my ancestral line took. But they're not looking at my genealogy, they're looking at my genetics, and they're able to tell me this is the path my ancestor took. And it's just a really fun interactive tool that can actually help you figure out where to look for records. Because if I knew my ancestor was in Texas, but I wasn't sure where they were at before that, I could look at this map and see that this particular line was in Texas, and then it was in Kentucky, and then it was in the Carolinas. And so it's a really helpful tool for genealogy.

[B]

Oh, and you've got to love things that can help you visualize it, right?

[C]

Yes.

[B]

Those are both fantastic. Well, wonderful advice. And we've been talking about Ancestry DNA and myheritage DNA with. With your DNA guide, Diane Southard. And, Diane, we often see you in Family Tree Magazine. Where can people visit you online?

[C]

Yeah, you can find [e-mail] or, of course, we're on all the social media channels as well.

[B]

Thanks so much for shedding light on all these updates. We look forward to talking to you again soon.

[C]

Of course. Thanks for having me.

[A]

Thanks so much for joining me for the Family Tree Magazine Best Websites podcast. You can find a link over to this month's best [e-mail] podcast. Also, while you're at the website, I would encourage you to sign up for our free email newsletter it's the perfect way to stay in touch with everything we've got going on at Family Tree Magazine, including our other podcasts, the Family Tree Magazine Podcast. I'm Lisa Louise Cook, and you can find me at my website, genealogygems.com where you'll find links to my Genealogy Gems podcast and our YouTube channel. Until next time, have fun climbing your family tree.