RootsFree
Open your tree

Your family tree, kept like an archive.

Private until you share it. Free, with no subscription and no card on file. Export everything, photos included, any time.

Import a tree with photos or start a tree with one name

Share it with family by link. They add, you approve.

  • $0 for good, nothing to cancel
  • GEDCOM 7 + photos out, one click
Ruth Kovac1958 –Daniel Kovac1929–2011Margaret Doyle1931–2019Walter Kovac1889–1957Anna Hudak1893–1970Thomas Doyle1898–1966Helen Sullivan1902–19881861–19231865–19311866–19401870–19281870–19311874–19501868–19361871–1945
Five generations of one family. Filled dots have a source. Open ones do not have one yet.

What people pay to put up with.

Three lines on billing, lock-in and copied trees, quoted word for word with their sources. Under each, what RootsFree does instead.

Billing

If you cancel before the end of your subscription, an early termination fee of up to $25 may apply.

Ancestry’s subscription page, read .

No card on file. There is no plan, so there is nothing to renew or cancel.

Lock-in

all of my families pictures are forever being held hostage

Ancestry review on Trustpilot.

Export with photos, any time. One button in the header, on every screen.

Copied trees

It is essentially a giant game of ‘Telephone.’ If User A makes a mistake in 1998, and User B copies it in 2005, and User C imports it in 2015, Ancestry’s algorithm eventually sees that mistake as a ‘pattern.’

Family History Foundation, ThruLines reality check.

Hints from records only. Never from other trees. Each one shows the page image and says how sure it is.

The promise, in 9 lines.

  1. No subscription.There is no plan to buy and no trial that turns into one.
  2. No auto-renew.Nothing renews, so there is nothing to remember to cancel.
  3. No card on file.We never ask for a card. Gifts happen on Ko-fi, GitHub or Stripe.
  4. No ads.Not on the tree, not on the guides, not later.
  5. We never sell your data.Your tree lives in your browser. We do not have it to sell.
  6. Living people are hidden by default.Anyone who may be alive stays out of exports, charts and maps.
  7. Export everything, any time.GEDCOM 7 and a zip of every photo, in one click.
  8. Delete everything, any time.Clear this site's data and it is gone. No copy waits on a server.
  9. The code is open.Anyone can read it and check these lines against it.

Kept free by the people who use it.

Hosting costs about $94 a year. Tips cover it. There is no card form here; giving happens on Ko-fi, GitHub or Stripe.

How to support RootsFree