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Do you share DNA with celebrities? Will AncestryDNA match results tell you which famous people you're related to?
Why DNA Testing is Great For Genealogy
DNA is great because we can match with various distant cousins. Maybe even out to tenth cousins if you're lucky enough. And when you think about who a tenth cousin is, we are probably all related to some famous people.
In fact, if you've ever played, you know, Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, where you figure out how you're related to Kevin Bacon. It only takes a few people that you find out how closely related you are to Kevin Bacon.
In fact, I think when I've played it before and four degrees. That's how far away from Kevin Bacon I am. Through people that I know, not through people that I'm related to. But Kevin Bacon isn't the only famous person out there.
Watch this video.
Finding Famous People on Your Ancestry DNA Match List
You might want to know whether or not you're related to other famous people. Can AncestryDNA tell you if you're connected to other famous people?
NO!
I went and looked at the Ancestry DNA website and did a quick perusal of everything on it. I don't find a single list of famous people that I'm related to.
But don't fret. That doesn't mean Ancestry is not going to tell you that you're related to famous people. However, there's a caveat. The celebrities have to have tested and made their results publicly searchable.
This pertains to living famous people that you might be related to and if they'll show up on your DNA match list.
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How Famous Does Your DNA Matches Need to Be?
While you're probably not going to find too many extremely famous people in your DNA match list, you might find some notable people. I have a relative related to an actor in Hollywood who actually has his own IMDB page.
Now he's not a, you know, super big-name actor. But the fact of the matter is he has an IMDB page. And she's his second cousin.
So, that's a famous person, right?
23andMe's Old Famous Relatives in Your Haplogroups
Previously 23andMe had a feature where they would tell you famous people in your haplogroup. They don't seem to have that anymore.
However, the problem with using a haplogroup as being closely related to them or related to somebody is that that haplogroup may go back hundreds or thousands of years before you have a common ancestor. So, we're not talking tenth cousins. We're talking 20th or 30th or 40th cousins, for that matter.
Also, these are your famous relatives along your mt-DNA or y-DNA lines. Likely, you're actually related to a celebrity through some other line. It's just not on that haplogroup.
If you're looking for famous relatives, you're probably not going to find them on AncestryDNA's match list unless those famous people have already put their DNA on Ancestry.
However, you can see famous relatives from your genealogical tree using Relative Finder, which pulls data from the FamilySearch.org website.
For more Genetic Genealogy Questions:
Photo credit: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons