How to View a GEDCOM File Online — Free, No Upload, No Account

You've just been handed a family tree. Maybe a relative emailed you a .ged file, maybe you exported your research from Ancestry before your subscription ran out, or maybe you found an old GEDCOM on a backup drive. Now you want one simple thing: to see the tree inside it — without installing software, creating yet another account, or uploading your family's data to a stranger's server.

That's exactly why we built the free online GEDCOM viewer. Drop the file in, and seconds later you're exploring an interactive family tree. Nothing is uploaded, nothing is stored, and you don't need an account.

What is a GEDCOM file?

GEDCOM (GEnealogical Data COMmunication) is the universal exchange format for family-tree data. It was created back in 1984, and to this day it remains the one format that virtually every genealogy program understands. Ancestry, MyHeritage, FamilySearch, Gramps, Family Tree Maker, RootsMagic — all of them can export your research as a single .ged text file.

Inside that file is everything that makes up a family tree:

• People — names, sex, and identifiers
• Families — who married whom, and who their children are
• Events — births, baptisms, marriages, occupations, deaths, burials, each with dates and places
• Notes and sources — research notes and the citations that back them up

Because GEDCOM is plain text, it can be read anywhere — including directly in your browser. That last part matters more than you might think.

The problem with most GEDCOM viewers

Search for "GEDCOM viewer" and you'll find three kinds of tools:

1. Desktop software you have to download and install — often Windows-only, often dated.
2. Online services that ask you to create an account before showing you anything.
3. Upload-based viewers that send your file to their server to "process" it.

The third kind deserves a pause. A GEDCOM file is not just data — it's your family. Names, birth dates, and places of living relatives. Do you know what that server does with the file after you close the tab? Usually, neither do we.

A viewer that never sees your file

The Kinfoly GEDCOM viewer takes a different approach: the file is parsed entirely in your browser. When you drop a .ged file onto the page, it is read by JavaScript running on your own device. No upload. No storage. Close the tab, and the data is gone.

It's free, there is no account, and it reads GEDCOM versions 5.5, 5.5.1 and 7.0 — which covers the export of every major genealogy program — up to 50 MB per file.

What you can do with it

Explore the interactive tree

The viewer opens on an hourglass tree centred on one person: their ancestors above, descendants below, spouses beside them. Click anyone to see their profile; double-click to re-centre the tree around them and walk through the generations. Remarriages are handled properly — the focus person's marriages are laid out side by side, each with its own children, so blended families finally make visual sense.

Browse every person in the file

The People view is a searchable, sortable table of everyone in the file — birth and death dates and places, age, and family summary. Filter by women, men, or people with missing dates (a great way to spot gaps in your research).

See what's actually in your file

The Statistics view answers the question "what did I just open?" at a glance: how many people, families and events the file contains, how many generations it spans, births by decade, the most common surnames, the oldest person, average lifespans by century — and any records the viewer couldn't read, listed openly instead of silently dropped.

How to open your file — three steps

1. Go to kinfoly.com/gedcom-viewer.
2. Drag your .ged file onto the page (or tap to choose it on a phone).
3. That's it. The tree opens in a couple of seconds.

No file handy? The viewer includes a sample tree, so you can try it right now.

How to export a GEDCOM from your genealogy site

• Ancestry: Trees → Tree Settings → Export tree. The download is a ready .ged file.
• MyHeritage: Family tree → Manage trees → Export to GEDCOM.
• FamilySearch: use the Export option in Family Tree apps that support GEDCOM download.
• Gramps / Family Tree Maker / RootsMagic: all have "Export → GEDCOM" in their file menus.

And when you're ready to do more than look

A viewer is read-only by design. If you spot a wrong date, a missing sibling, or a branch you want to keep growing, you can import the same GEDCOM file into a free Kinfoly account and continue where the file left off: edit people and relationships, attach photos and documents, add source citations, and keep your tree private by default.

But that's your next step, only if you want it. Today, if all you need is to see the tree inside a .ged file — open the viewer and drop it in. It stays on your device, start to finish.