Genealogy on YouTube

I am an avid consumer of content on YouTube. Most of it has nothing to do with genealogy, but more and more I find myself wishing I had genealogy related content lining up in my subscription box. I have set out to round up all the active YouTube channels providing regular educational or entertaining genealogical content that I believe will appeal to a wide audience. Note that there are many places to host video content on the Internet, this is only a list of creators who host content on YouTube.

I will make every effort to keep this list updated as I learn of new YouTube channels or notice old ones going dormant. Creators who have not uploaded new content in over 1 year will be dropped from the list. If you want to suggest a channel for me to check out or notice a broken link, please tell me about it in the comments and I will give it a look!

Including a channel on this list is not an endorsement of its content or quality.

My Top 2 Favorites:

Family History Fanatics, Andy, Devon Noel and Caleb Lee – The Lee Family is one of the most consistent and frequent publishers of genealogy-related content on YouTube. They post several times a week providing videos about methodology and current hot topics in the genealogy community. You can even catch the occasional live streaming event. This home-grown channel is not affiliated with any of the corporate giants that seem to produce most of the genealogy videos found on YouTube. If you want knowledgeable, entertaining, family-friendly and independent genealogical content, this is the place to get it!

The Barefoot Genealogist, Crista Cowan (Sponsored by Ancestry and hosted on the Ancestry YouTube channel) – Crista Cowan has an incredible ability to take any new idea, feature or skill and explain it in a way that is understandable to a novice. I thoroughly enjoy hearing what she has to say about Ancestry and genealogy in general in her weekly show on Ancestry’s channel. When Crista is not posting Ancestry also populates their channel with marketing videos and short instructional spots, so be prepared for a little inbox clutter each time a new advertising campaign is launched.

Other YouTube Channels:

Amy Johnson Crow, Amy Johnson Crow

AmericanAncestors, New England Historic Genealogical Society

Ancestral Findings, Ancestral Findings (Podcast – no visual content)

Auntie Jen’s Family Trees, Jen Rickards

Blaine Bettinger, Blaine Bettinger

BYU Family History Library, BYU

DAR National Headquarters, Daughters of the American Revolution

DearMYRTLE, Pat Richley-Erickson

DIY Genealogist, Heather Collins

Extreme Genes, Scott Fisher (Podcast – no visual content)

FamilySearch, FamilySearch.org

Family Tree Magazine, Family Tree Magazine

Five-Minute Genealogy, Mike O’Neill

Genealogy Gems, Lisa Louise Cooke

Genealogy Sucks!, Natalia

Genealogy Tutorials, Lisa Buckner

Genealogy TV, Connie Knox

GeneaVlogger, Jarrett Ross

Hamilton County Genealogical Society, Hamilton County Genealogical Society (Ohio)

In-Depth Genealogist, Terri O’Connell and Jennifer Alford

Jason Lee, Jason Lee

LissaLisson.com, Lissa Lisson

MyHeritage, MyHeritage

National Genealogical Society, National Genealogical Society

NextGen Genealogy Network, The NextGen Genealogy Network

RootsMagicTV, RootsMagic

US National Archives, NARA (Especially look for their Virtual Genealogy Fair videos!)

Who is Nicka Smith?, Nicka Smith (host of BlackProGen Live)