Ancestry's Ethnicity Update Is Finally Here - Share Yours!

[Jill Eaton]

Remember as well that the solid colour dots are meant to represent DNA from 300 to 1000 years ago.

The solid dot with a dashed line surrounding it is 50 to 300 years ago.

If you paper trail doesn't go back over 300 you may not know whether you had ancestors from a particular country or region.

Far more problematic if your unknown or surprising ethnicity result is within the 50 to 300 years category and your research does go back that far.

[Gadget]

I assume it's produced for those who haven't done a thorough tree.  I have gathered this information over many years already 

add - And they then use our trees to work out the communities :

When we discover communities, we use information from family trees AncestryDNA members have linked to their test results to learn about the historical forces that may have brought their ancestors together

[emeraldcity]

My results were previously just a mix of English and Scottish but seeing some new trace regions appearing with this new update - Norway, Ireland and Sweden/Denmark. I’m assuming they’re mixed in with my Scottish which is all Highlands/Outer Hebrides?

Scottish is now my majority at 59%. I had a single Scottish great grandmother (who was from the Hebrides) and it all seems to stem from her!

[Knight-Sunderland]

I get more and more Scottish with every update.

Was about 20% in 2015 and now 53% in 2021.

I will be wearing a kilt by the time I'm 30.

[bairn359]

newest update -
Scotland 88%
Wales 6%
Ireland 4%
England & Northwestern Europe 2%

previous update -
Scotland 84%
England & Northwestern Europe 14%
Wales 2%

So in the last two updates I have went from having no Welsh to 2% and now 6% despite having no Welsh ancestors that i can find.  I do have Cornish in my tree which i have traced quite far back. I reckon this has been lumped in with their Welsh grouping. 

In the original update I lost my 2% Scandinavian which i actually felt was more accurate. I think that went to my Scottish total.

The new Irish addition maybe slightly high although i have indeed found Irish on one line.

[DaveMcC]

My previous was 70% Scottish (Scottish Lowlands, Merrick and West Central Scotland) 30% Irish (Ulster and South Down & North Louth) but with new update it is 68% Scottish 30% Irish and 2% England and North Western Europe.

My mum got 85% Scottish, 8% Irish, 3% England and Northwestern Europe, 2% Wales and 2% Norwegian and my maternal grandmothers family who also did DNA tests, on one side they also got part Norwegian which makes sense given their surname is possibly Scandinavian in origin and my mum  got a DNA match to at least one person living in Norway.

I knew I had ancestors that came from Scotland and possibly England but being from Northern Ireland I am finding it difficult to trace my ancestors back far enough beyond x5 great grandparents due to records not going back far enough to confirm anything (Marriage records started in 1845, Birth and Death 1864 onwards in Ireland) so before then I had to go on other records such as some wills and grave headstones and other records.

Even my x2 great grandparents on my dads side that I found out lived and got married in Scotland, originally came from Ulster (County Tyrone) but I do have reletives that live in Scotland. Many of my direct ancestors do have Scottish family names though.

I knew about the Irish side as that is mostly on my dads side and a small % on my mums side.

My family tree has my reletives in Northern Ireland, Ireland, Scotland, Canada, USA, Australia that I was able to confirm with records but I have not been able to confirm anyone in my family back further than in Ireland in the mid 1700s with will and grave headstones or early 1800s for marriage fathers names, death records post 1864 and grave headstones. I don't want to put anyone in my tree that I can't confirm in some way.

I have seen many peoples family trees often have the wrong information about people and no sources to back anything up such as the people who have my x3 great grandmother on their tree, all say she died in the USA in different locations but I have been to my x3 great grandparents grave and photographed it and posted it to my tree as she did not ever live or die in the USA.

[brigidmac]

Ive become more English 8% up from 2% which makes far more sense as my mother is 17% English but ive lost some of my Scottishness 48% instesd of 56% which im sad about

My mother has gained back 2% of Scandinavian which.id have liked rather than my 2% inexplicable Italian

[TinaRoyal]

How can I put this discretely.  DNA is a record of the Ancestors you have, your Family Tree is a record of the Ancestors you think you have.

[Gadget]

How can I put this discretely.  DNA is a record of the Ancestors you have, your Family Tree is a record of the Ancestors you think you have.

I think that you are confusing DNA with Ancestry's estimates of ethnicity. Their estimates are dependent on their reference group.   In addition to different reference groups, each company seem to use slightly different measures to calculate ethnicity.

Also, it's important to look at the range for each %. It's likely that, for many of us, very little has changed . For example, 3% could be anything between 0-9%;   9% is  0-20%, etc.  In my case, My Welsh portion has increased from 75% to 88% (range - 61-99). None of the regions have changed.