Most likely the family history breakthroughs you need to connect to elusive ancestors hiding somewhere in billions of free, unindexed digital record images at FamilySearch.org, are now a simple search away. Thanks to the release of FamilySearch’s new Explore Historical Images feature, your likelihood of finding records about ancestors has increased dramatically. The new tool helps users easily navigate the growing sea of free digital image collections at FamilySearch to make ancestor discoveries more quickly.

Searching Digital-Image-Only Collections

FamilySearch has published billions of images of historical records from archives worldwide and continues to add over 350 million new record images every year—millions per week. About 80 percent of those online genealogical records are not searchable by name—meaning that you might not be able to just type in the names of ancestors to find them. Filling in the missing branches of your family tree requires sleuthing through digital images of the original records online.

John Alexander, records experience manager at FamilySearch, said, “If FamilySearch has a digital-only image of your ancestor’s genealogical records—which it most likely does—now, through a friendly interface, Explore Images will enable you to go to a single source to find it.”

How Does It Work?

Type in a place-name (city, state, county, or country) for an ancestor event (birth, marriage, date, other), and Explore Historical Images searches FamilySearch’s digital-only collections and returns relevant record collections that meet your criteria.

Alexander said that a very small percentage of FamilySearch.org users have been taking advantage of the rich content in FamilySearch’s billions of record images. For them, Explore Images is going to be a game changer in making ancestor connections. “Previously, you would have to become very familiar with navigating the FamilySearch Catalog online to find what was there. Explore Images simplifies that experience,” said Alexander.

Try FamilySearch Explore Historical Images now. (Requires a free account).

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