Most duplicates are created when accepting Ancestry Hints®, attaching records, or saving a person from one tree to another. This article explains how to avoid creating duplicates in the future; to merge duplicates you already have, see Merging Duplicate People.
When adding people from family tree hints
- When viewing hints on a profile page, click Review for an Ancestry Member Tree hint.
- Check the box beside a tree to compare the information in that tree to yours and click Review selected tree hints.
- Scroll down to review the other relatives that will be added to your tree and look for a message saying NEW PERSON beside the names. Another way to spot "new" people is that for new people, information will be listed only on the left side of the page and not on the right side.
- If the "new" person is already in your tree, click Not a new person?. Allowing the person to be added as a new person will create a duplicate person in your tree.
- Select the person in your tree and click Select. Repeat this for each person on the page who’s listed as a new person but who's already in your tree.
When adding a person from someone else's tree
When copying a person from someone else's family tree, type their name into the "Person in Tree" field to look for them in your tree. If their name is there, select the name and click Save instead of adding them as a new person in your tree. This will add their information to your tree without adding a person you already have.
After clicking Save, scroll down and click Not a new person on anyone who’s already in your tree. Then, click Save to your tree.
