2023: MyHeritage Year in Review

As we turn the last page of 2023 at MyHeritage, we reflect on another year of ups and downs, with moments of great success alongside moments of complexity. All these moments underscored the resilience and determination at the heart of the MyHeritage team.

This year has been a testament to how innovation and hard work are our driving forces. MyHeritage continuously pushes the boundaries of what’s possible in the realm of family history. Our journey in 2023 has been marked by groundbreaking advancements, leveraging AI technology for family history research in new ways; heartwarming reunions; and a continued, unwavering commitment to connecting people with their heritage.

Let’s take a look back at 2023:

January

We started the year on the right foot by introducing new enhancements to the powerful Photo Tagger feature, which allows you to easily tag multiple photos of the same individual in one go. Enhancements included tagging suggestions being accessible from additional key locations on the MyHeritage website.

You can now see and confirm tagging suggestions when viewing all photos featuring a specific person, or when reviewing single photos.

Next we made it super easy for any MyHeritage DNA user to share their ethnicity results in a cool video, without the need to create and edit videos from screen recordings. There has recently been a global trend of MyHeritage users sharing the “spinning globe” video revealing their DNA results, and even people with very few followers received millions of views, like the one below.

@caty.thegreat

Well, I guess I was lied to #myheritage #myheritagedna #dnatest #dnatestresult #fyp #foryoupage #ethnicity

♬ original sound – Stan 🙂

With this new video sharing capability, it’s now easier than ever to share your MyHeritage DNA results in a few simple steps.

We indexed and published Israel Immigration Lists, an exclusive collection covering immigration to Israel from 1919 onwards, with 1.7 million records. This collection is the Israeli equivalent of the famous “Ellis Island” immigration database for the United States. Almost every genealogist in Israel will find direct ancestors and other relatives in this valuable collection.

February

To mark Presidents’ Day, the MyHeritage Research team dove into the 1950 U.S. Census that we released in the previous year, to see what they could find about the lives of U.S. presidents past and present — Biden, Trump, Obama and Clinton. The information found in the 1950 census proves that it can provide a wealth of information about people who lived during that time, including their family backgrounds, education, and professions.

March

The RootsTech 2023 conference, held in Salt Lake City and also online, is always a landmark event for the genealogy community, bringing together family history enthusiasts from all over the world, and we’re proud to have been a significant part of it. MyHeritage offered a packed schedule of activities, including lectures from our expert genealogists and a fascinating address by Founder and CEO Gilad Japhet, who shared the latest advancements in genealogy and DNA, and announced exciting new features.

Watch the recording of Gilad’s session here:

At RootsTech we were excited to announce the release of the cM Explainer™. cM Explainer™ is an innovative, free feature that estimates familial relationships between DNA Matches on MyHeritage with high accuracy. It helps overcome the challenge of understanding relationships to DNA Matches. For every DNA Match, cM Explainer™ predicts the possible relationships between the two people and the respective probabilities of each relationship, estimates who their most recent common ancestor(s) could be, and displays a diagram showing their relationship path. cM Explainer™ is unique in the way it uses both the centimorgan value as well as the ages of the two individuals (if known) to fine-tune its predictions, making MyHeritage the only major genealogy company to offer relationship prediction at this level of granularity and accuracy.

cM Explainer™ is fully integrated into the MyHeritage platform to shed light on any DNA Match found on MyHeritage, and is also available as a free standalone tool to benefit individuals who have tested with other DNA services.

Another great feature that was announced in March was the addition of color coding for family trees in the two main views of the tree: Family view and Pedigree view. This addition is both visually appealing and makes it easier to understand your family tree at a glance.

Lastly but not least, we announced another installment of MyHeritage pro bono project DNA Quest. We believe that everyone, everywhere, has a right to know their roots, and so we relaunched MyHeritage DNA Quest and offered thousands of additional, free DNA kits to adoptees and family members of adoptees searching for their biological families. Some of the incredible reunion stories that have been made possible thanks to this initiative are described further below.

We ended March by enhancing the look of the category and collection pages on MyHeritage’s search engine for historical records, making them easier to use.

April

In April, our very own Geoff Rasmussen hosted the 4^th annual 24-Hour Genealogy Webinar Marathon on Legacy Family Tree Webinars.

Geoff hosted a stellar cast of top-notch speakers on genealogy, with topics covering a huge range of areas of interest, including geographical locations from Latin America to the U.K. to Scandinavia to Australia. More than 53,000 people registered and enjoyed the live sessions. Replays of each session can be found here.

Not long after its release, we improved relationship predictions within the cM Explainer™ to enable our DNA customers to more efficiently manage their DNA Matches and better understand family relationships.

May

In May we updated the data for Theory of Family Relativity™, adding millions of new theories to help you uncover how you’re related to your DNA Matches. The total number of theories has grown 61%, bringing the number to 136,713,021.

Ahead of one of the biggest events of 2023, the coronation of King Charles III, the MyHeritage Research team dove into the collection of historical newspapers in the MyHeritage database, reviewed dozens of newspapers from all over the world, and explored the ads surrounding past coronations to see how advertisers got creative and promoted their products in the spirit of the times.

We then featured the story of MyHeritage users who uncovered photos of their ancestors in the New South Wales Gaol Inmates & Photos collection on MyHeritage. The collection, which was added to MyHeritage in late 2022, courtesy of the New South Wales State Archives, includes fascinating photographs of prisoners from several jails in New South Wales between 1870–1930. We brought these photos to life by animating, colorizing, and enhancing them with MyHeritage’s AI photo features.

At the end of May we announced the launch of Reimagine, our new mobile app for family photos which uses our world-class AI technologies for improving historical photos, and boasts a powerful photo scanner that enables high-speed scanning of entire album pages. Reimagine is available on both iOS and Android.

June

In June, we shared the groundbreaking story of Scott Lieberman, a Chilean adoptee stolen as a baby who grew up in California, USA. Scott reunited with his sister thanks to MyHeritage and the help of a nonprofit called Nos Buscamos. Watch Scott’s Touching Reaction to His DNA Results.

The story of Scott’s journey to find his family quickly captured hearts around the world. To learn more about how his story was shared in the media worldwide, take a look at the links provided in our media coverage section below.

July

In honor of July 4th, MyHeritage explored the family history of Steve Doocy, host of Fox & Friends, and surprised him with information about his connection to the first 3 presidents of the United States: George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson. Watch the segment here.

Throughout 2023 we’ve been ramping up our pace of content publication, and in July we celebrated adding an average of one collection added or updated per day for an entire year, with a total of 373 million records added. We’re making great strides in our commitment to providing you with the best resources for your family history research by adding and updating historical record collections every day.

In July, our Research team unearthed records of 4 extremely influential U.S. citizens in the collection of United States Passport Applications, 1795–1925 on MyHeritage. We then used our photo features to bring their photos to life, and the results are incredible.

August

We released PhotoDater™, a unique free feature that uses powerful AI technology to estimate when a photo was taken.

This feature can help you unlock further clues about who appears in the photo and the event at which it was taken, to solve mysteries in your genealogy research. This feature is exclusive to MyHeritage.

Learn more about PhotoDater™ in this video:

As the back-to-school season got underway, we showcased a collection of school photos from the past century, sourced from our users’ photo repositories. Harnessing MyHeritage’s photo tools, we colorized, enhanced, and restored these old photographs, bringing them to life in a new and vibrant way.

September

We published the 1931 Canadian census collection, complete with a new index created by MyHeritage. This collection, which contains information on 10.4 million individuals living in Canada in 1931, is the latest addition to our vast collection of Canadian historical documents, now encompassing 175 collections with 113.7 million records in total.

Legacy Family Tree Webinars hosted the fourth annual Webtember, a free, month-long online genealogy conference. Held every Friday in September, registrants enjoyed multiple webinars with expert speakers on a wide variety of family history topics from the comfort of home.

October

In October we were devastated to learn of the tragic deaths of Ron Shemer and Ilay Nachman, two members of the MyHeritage employee family. Ron and Ilay were murdered in the early morning of October 7, 2023, while separately attending the Nova music festival. Ron was 23 years old, and Ilay was almost 24.

Ron and Ilay were loved and respected by all who knew them, and to honor their memory, we offered the MyHeritage community a window into the lives of two exceptional men who will forever remain young.

November

In November, we added the ability to secure your MyHeritage account with Email-Based Two-Factor Authentication. At MyHeritage, the privacy and security of your data is our highest priority, and we have taken and continue to make significant steps to that end. Enabling Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) adds an extra layer of protection to your account. Adding Two-Factor Authentication to your MyHeritage account is now a mandatory requirement for all DNA customers, but we recommend adding it even if you are not a DNA customer.

PhotoDater™, our revolutionary free feature that uses AI technology to estimate when historical photos were taken, was made available on the MyHeritage mobile app and on the Reimagine app in addition to the website.

After conducting research on the England & Wales, Birth Index, 1837-2005 on MyHeritage, we identified some interesting trends about baby girl names. We uncovered the most popular baby girl names in the UK over the last 100 years.

Check out the changes and trends through this neat visualization:

December

The year ended with a “roar” as we released a flurry of incredible new features, that were in the making throughout the entire year, and additional historical records.

First, we announced the launch of the MyHeritage Wiki: the new, community-led online encyclopedia for genealogy and DNA. The new wiki is hosted on MyHeritage, but its scope is very broad and goes far beyond the specifics of the MyHeritage service.

We invite you to join us to help build the ultimate online encyclopedia for family history and DNA. We are seeking experts, volunteer writers, editors, and moderators as well as proofreaders, community coordinators, and translators. Whatever your skills, you can be part of the movement to make family history more accessible than ever before! Fill out this form to become a contributor.

After that, we published the Germany, North Rhine Westphalia Marriages, 1874-1899 collection. Comprising 4 million records, this collection includes excellent scanned images of the originals. It is exclusive to MyHeritage and cannot be found on any other commercial site.

Just before the year’s end, we released two powerful AI features: AI Record Finder™ and AI Biographer™.

AI Record Finder™ is the world’s first AI chat-based search engine for historical records. AI Record Finder™ transforms family history research using Artificial Intelligence (AI) chat. It is an interactive, intelligent, free-text chat to help you locate historical records about a specific ancestor or relative, using MyHeritage’s vast database of nearly 20 billion records.

AI Biographer™ is an exciting new feature that’s exclusive to MyHeritage. With a single click, it automatically compiles a Wikipedia-style biography article about a person’s life. It uses details from matching historical records and family tree profiles, and curates the information into a beautiful, well-written article that will make you proud.

MyHeritage User Stories

Here are just a few of the stories we shared this year about users who made life-changing discoveries thanks to MyHeritage:

Through a MyHeritage DNA Match, 66-year-old Loren McDonald finally found the answer to a lifelong question: the identity of his father. A newfound cousin even sent Loren a letter his father had written years ago, giving him priceless insight into his father’s life and thoughts.

Elvira, from Barcelona, Spain, was one of three siblings abandoned at a railway station in her childhood. A distant match on MyHeritage led her and her siblings to connect with biological family members, unveiling the dark pasts and identities of their parents, and bringing light to long-held mysteries of their family history.

Aimee Haynes discovered, through MyHeritage DNA, that despite what the family had believed for decades, her great-grandfather was not the product of an affair.

Janis Holmgren was surprised to learn in her late 70s that the man she always thought was her father was not her biological father. Through MyHeritage, she uncovered her father’s true identity and the tragic love story that haunted her mother for years.

Alice Grusová was separated as a child from her family, and abandoned at a train station by her parents in order to save her from the Nazis during WWII. Alice survived the war, and thanks to a Smart Match™ with a distant cousin on MyHeritage, was reunited with her family, including a son her aunt mentioned in her last letter.

Growing up in a children’s home in Alfaro, La Rioja, Spain, Vicenta Ruiz Oriol had little knowledge of her origins or her parents. However, through a combination of DNA testing and traditional family history research, Vicenta successfully uncovered her true identity and reunited with 3 siblings.

Kate Valério‘s life was turned upside down when her MyHeritage DNA results revealed a surprising mix of North African and Middle Eastern ancestry — and a mystifying message in her inbox from a DNA Match. The conversation led Kate to finally learn the identity of her biological father, which her mother had kept secret all her life. Follow Kate on her extraordinary path of self-discovery in the two part video series: Part 1, Part 2.

More MyHeritage User Stories in the Media

Throughout the past year, the incredible stories from MyHeritage users and the fascinating findings from our research team have caught the attention of media outlets around the world.

Here are some of the standout media moments featuring MyHeritage in 2023:

David Rossler spent years searching for the house and the family that helped him and his mother evade the concentration camps during the war. Through MyHeritage, David reunited with the family that hid him during the Holocaust. Read the story on Newsweek and on the MyHeritage Blog.

Eighty years after they were written, Carol Bohlin of Vermont received a collection of WWII love letters her parents exchanged, discovered by a stranger in her parents’ former New York home. These treasured letters, sent while her father served in the U.S. Navy, were hidden in a wall and have now been brought to light, allowing Carol to read them aloud in this Fox News segment and on the MyHeritage Blog.

After 75 years apart, sisters Annie Ijpelaar and Sheila Anne Fry, both 75, were reunited thanks to Sheila’s daughter-in-law’s efforts to find her long-lost relative with MyHeritage. Born just months apart and placed for adoption at the end of WWII, Sheila, who grew up unaware of her birth parents in the UK, discovered her half-sister living in the Netherlands. Watch the touching reunion and read their full story at this Metro link and on the MyHeritage Blog.

In this Norwegian story, featured on Norway’s tv2, Line Edøy found her father through MyHeritage after 30 years. It was also featured in English on the MyHeritage Blog.

As mentioned previously, Scott Lieberman from California discovered he was illegally taken from his mother in Chile and adopted by an American couple. He received a free MyHeritage DNA test through a partnership between the non-profit organization Nos Buscamos and MyHeritage. The revelation led to an emotional first meeting with the sister he never knew. Scott’s story was featured in several publications, including USA Today and CNN. You can also read the full story on the MyHeritage Blog.

Celina and Joseph Quinones, a married couple from Colorado with three children, discovered they were cousins. The discovery came 10 years into their marriage, after they took MyHeritage DNA tests as part of Celina’s family tree research. Celina shared their story in a viral TikTok video viewed over 4.4 million times. It was met with mixed reactions, as detailed in their interview with People magazine.

Raylane Amaral, a 28-year-old woman from Brazil, discovered that she was one of three babies switched at birth in a maternity ward 28 years ago, after taking a MyHeritage DNA test. You can read the full story in this The Sun UK article.

Thanks to MyHeritage, a touching Mother’s Day letter written by WWI American soldier Carl Howe was delivered to the granddaughter he never met. You can watch her emotional reading of her grandfather’s original letter in this segment by USA Today, or on the MyHeritage Blog.

Julie Mamo from Australia reconnected with her sister, with the same first name, after 60 years, thanks to a MyHeritage DNA test. One of Julie’s nephews, Jason Fisher, intrigued by his “olive complexion,” took the test as well, leading to the discovery. Read the full story in the Daily Mail and on the MyHeritage Blog.

The NY Post highlighted the story of brothers Rhys Williams, a 27-year-old British man, and Chris Jones, 53. The brothers found each other through a MyHeritage DNA test, after Rhys learned the man who raised him wasn’t his biological father and decided to explore his family tree. You can also read about it on the MyHeritage Blog.

The MyHeritage research team revealed the story behind the woman who spearheaded the celebration of Father’s Day in 1910 in her hometown of Spokane, Washington, Sonora Smart Dodd. We unearthed numerous historical documents previously unknown to Dodd’s descendants. Discover more in the full AP article.

After 42 years, American Jimmy Lippert Thyden, who was illegally adopted as a newborn, reunited with his birth family in Valdivia, Chile. Watch their emotional reunion in a video featured in this USA Today article, and on the MyHeritage Blog.

Former Irish Olympian Shane Healy, 54, reunited with his long-lost sister after 50 years, thanks to MyHeritage DNA. Discover more about this touching reunion in the Irish Sun article.

This Chronicle Live article features an impressive story of Newbiggin-by-the-Sea, a Northumberland coastal village, who created one of the world’s largest family trees. This extensive genealogy project documents 40,000 individuals, tracing their lineage back to around 1200, all recorded on MyHeritage. It is also featured on the MyHeritage Blog.

Mary Butler’s mother Bobbi has been searching for her siblings since she was placed for adoption 65 years ago. After taking a MyHeritage DNA test, Mary received a match to her biological uncle, who had uploaded his DNA data to MyHeritage. Catch the heartwarming story on Good Morning America, and on the MyHeritage Blog.

Historical record collections

Over the past year, MyHeritage has expanded its already extensive database, adding 366 new collections, with over 700 million historical records. This effort is in line with our commitment to providing value to users eager to delve deeper into their family history. Our database of historical records now comprises almost 20 billion historical records.

Here’s a look at some of the valuable collections we’ve added or updated in 2023:

1910 Norway Census: Updated to include beautiful high-quality scanned images of the original census.

Israel, Immigration Lists: One of the most comprehensive sources available for genealogy in Israel. It contains lists of immigrants to Israel from 1919 onwards, and its index is exclusive to MyHeritage.

France Census: France conducted a national and standardized census every five years between 1836 and 1936 except for 1871 (delayed one year to 1872 due to the Franco-Prussian War) and 1916 (not conducted due to World War I). This year, we published the 1911 France Census, 1921 France Census, 1931 France Census, the Paris Census 1926,  Paris Census 1931, and Paris Census 1936. This was done thanks to our wonderful colleagues at Filae.

1931 Canada Census: The 1931 Canada Census was conducted on June 1, 1931, and enumerated over 10.4 million individuals.

Germany, North Rhine-Westphalia – Münster, Detmold, and Arnsberg Marriages, 1874-1899: An exclusive collection of marriage certificates from North Rhine-Westphalia from 1874 to 1899.

Germany, North Rhine-Westphalia Deaths: Death records from civil registration offices (Standesämter) of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia between 1874 and 1938 for the districts of Arnsberg, Detmold, Münster and most of Düsseldorf and Köln.

Webinars

Over the past year, we hosted 190 webinars on Legacy Family Tree Webinars. These webinars have offered a diverse range of topics, helmed by expert genealogists and historians, providing invaluable insights and learning opportunities. From beginner tips to advanced research techniques, each session has been crafted to cater to genealogy enthusiasts at every level.

Here are the top 10 watched MyHeritage-specific webinars of 2023:

MyHeritage: Your Personal Genealogy Archive by Melissa Barker

Ten MORE Secrets to Using MyHeritage by Daniel Horowitz

RootsTech Recap by Daniel Horowitz

See Your Family in a Whole New Light! by Diane Henriks

Family Statistics on MyHeritage by Uri Gonen

New Updates on Your MyHeritage Family Tree by Uri Gonen

DeepStory – Your Visual Storytelling Tool by Janna Helshtein

There is more at MyHeritage than family trees and photos by Fran Kitto

Top 10 Secrets to Using MyHeritage by Daniel Horowitz

Comment retrouver ses cousins d’Amérique du Nord grâce aux collections MyHeritage by Marie Cappart

Here are the top 10 highest-rated webinars of 2023:

Afro-Louisiana History and Genealogy, 1718-1820 by Nicka Smith

Dissection & Analysis of Research Problems: 10 Steps to a Solution by Elizabeth Shown Mills

Tick Marks and Number Counts: Understanding and Using the Slave Schedules by Renate Yarborough Sanders          

So, You Think You Know All About City Directories? by Paula Stuart-Warren

Okay, I ‘Got the Neighbors’—Now What Do I Do with Them?! By Elizabeth Shown Mills

Samuel Witter vs. Samuel Witter: Separating Same-Name Soldiers, War of 1812 by Elizabeth Shown Mills

Trousers, Black Domestic, Tacks & Housekeeping Bills: Problem-Solving with “Trivial Details” by Elizabeth Shown Mills

Margaret’s Baby’s Father & The Lessons He Taught Me by Elizabeth Shown Mills

Loyalists, Freedmen and Frauds in the Southern Claims Commission by Sharon Batiste Gillins

Tío Juvenal: Putting the Records, Context & Strategies All Together by Colleen Robledo Greene

The MyHeritage Team

This past year has been a period of significant growth for the MyHeritage team, which now includes more than 500 employees spread across the globe. Our MyHeritage family has grown even further with the weddings of 18 employees and the happy arrival of 32 babies born to our employees in 2023 🙂

Volunteering

As a company, we are committed to giving back to the community. Our team engages in a range of volunteer activities, from packaging food for those in need and supporting children who might not otherwise have the means to celebrate their birthdays, to spending quality time with the elderly. These initiatives are voluntary, but it’s inspiring to see so many of our team members enthusiastically participating and making a positive difference in the lives of others.

Fun days and celebrations

We regularly set aside time for team days and activities. These laid-back, enjoyable get-togethers are a chance for MyHeritage employees to kick back, have fun, and really get to know one another.

In September, the MyHeritage team embarked on a memorable three-day retreat to the Kedma Hotel in Israel, marking 20 years of MyHeritage’s journey. The celebration kicked off at a picturesque vineyard in the desert, where the team unwound with delightful food, wine tasting, and a choice of exhilarating activities like jeeping, segway tours, and sand surfing. The evening buzzed with energy as everyone enjoyed a lively dance party at the hotel.

The following day was a blend of relaxation and adventure, offering a range of activities from macrame crafting and invigorating ice baths to calming yoga and meditation sessions, not to mention plenty of poolside leisure.

The highlight of the retreat was the magical evening in the desert: an enchanting setup with long, elegantly laid tables, creating a scene from a fairytale. This special night featured heartfelt speeches, starting with Aaron Godfrey, VP of Marketing, and leading to an inspiring address by Gilad Japhet, our Founder and CEO. Gilad reflected on MyHeritage’s two-decade legacy, expressing gratitude to all who have contributed to the company’s success.

The evening’s speeches transitioned into a spectacular outdoor desert dance party that lasted well into the night. The festivities kicked off with an energetic performance by the renowned rapper, singer, and songwriter Tuna, followed by a star DJ who kept the atmosphere electric. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves, dancing and celebrating under the stars. The unique flair of MyHeritage’s 20th-anniversary celebration added an extra layer of excitement and joy to the event.

This unforgettable event not only celebrated the past but also energized the MyHeritage team with renewed determination and enthusiasm.

Looking ahead to 2024

Over the course of 2023, we’ve taken significant strides in making family history more accessible to our users by not only developing new features and tools but also enhancing the MyHeritage products you know and love. We’ve placed an emphasis on harnessing new technologies, particularly AI, to create innovative features for genealogy.

As we wrap up a busy and productive 2023 at MyHeritage, we’re already gearing up for what’s next in 2024. Our focus for 2024 will be on bringing you better genealogy products, adding a huge number of high-quality historical records, and making it easier and more enjoyable to explore your family history. We’re looking forward to sharing some exclusive genealogy content from around the world with you, aiming to add more depth and color to your family history discoveries. We’re committed to helping you uncover more about your roots in a way that’s both meaningful and fun.

Here’s to a 2024 full of new discoveries! Happy New Year!