Ancestry has updated origins with more defined regions, so this is a good time to look at the new outcomes.
For reference: My 2011 Genome Analysis was described as English or British with significant input from the continent. My dad came back as “basically British”.
Roughly 10 years later, updates from Ancestry DNA, Family Tree DNA and 23 and Me shows the progression of ancestry estimate results from 2015 up through 2020. The expansion of the data sets these companies have to reference is pretty clear.
It is good to keep in mind that it is not my ancestry or ethnicity that is changing, but their interpretation of the comparison of my genome with reference populations. In my mind, no particular interpretation is right or wrong, but any one could be misinformed by gaps in the data set a particular company is using.
I have found these ethnicity estimates most helpful when something looks considerably large and out of place. I don’t think my results or my dad’s results are particularly surprising, but my aunt Cheryl’s high amount of Irish ancestry and my wife’s large Scandinavian component have raised flags for me. In each of those cases, there were other factors that were flags too. The ethnicity estimates coincide with and seem to support other evidence of something unexpected.
Analysis of a European American Toe
I must have missed an opportunity to pontificate on the 2024 update, or titled it so poorly that I could not find it. The picture above shows part of the “What Changed” section of DNA origins. What used to be “England and Northwestern Europe” at 46% of my genome, now also contains some sub regions for me . There is a new conglomerate called “Southeastern England and Northwestern Europe” which is 48% of my genome. They also added new regions in Britain, basically adding more Britain to the existing Britain. I end up with West Midlands: 16%, Northern Wales and Northwest England: 11%, North East England: 6%, Devon and Somerset 2% and East Midlands 2%. In total, I think that is 85% of my genome.
On the map below you can see the overlapping blobs. Southeast England, Benelux, and Normandy in grass green there are 48%. The next biggest blob is West Midlands (16%), blue there with the Eng. abbreviation in it, overlapping with some Northern Wales and Northwest England (11%) and East Midlands. You can see these sorts of spheres of influence.
Moving along to other regions in the 2024 to 2025 comparison:
Two large changes jumped out to me. First, Germanic Europe (36%) has mostly disappeared, broken down to one region (for me) Northwestern Germany at 3%. Second, Central Scotland and Ireland is only 2%, dropping 15 points.
I gained Southern Wales, The Netherlands (as separate from Benelux) and Denmark. I also switched Portugal out for Western Ukraine. In the past I’ve assumed this 1% is the mystery quotient. I have no known genealogical roots in Western Ukraine.
New Categories
Looking at the overview, They’ve Broken up Britain and Northern Ireland into two overarching groups, England and Celtic and Gaelic. In this context, England contains a chunk of the coastal continent that is closely related through centuries of immigration and trade. If my math is correct, “Basically British Isles” is about 90% of me with the rest divided up between Western Europe (Northwestern Germany and Netherlands) and Nordic (Denmark) with the remainder mystery 1% that I think every company struggles with in Central and Eastern Europe.
By Parent
I really like this feature of Ancestry DNA. It would be best to have tested my parents, but even without that they are doing their best to tease apart matches and ancestry. The graphic below is the ring chart from the perspective of the DNA I got from my dad. Southeastern England is a crossover group with my mom.
Here is the ring graph for DNA from my mom with the associated regions. Again, Southeastern England is a shared group. Mystery spot, western Ukraine, is associated with my mom.
All that kind of puts me back at 2011 and the green dot that represents me on average. British with significant continental input.
