Are you stuck on a brick wall ancestor and wondering if you should hire a professional genealogist? Need help untangling conflicting evidence? Or perhaps you want someone to review your family history research for accuracy?
Finding the right professional genealogist in Australia can feel overwhelming. Unlike other professions, genealogy isn’t regulated here. Anyone can call themselves a professional genealogist. There’s no single membership body or directory to consult.
This guide will help you navigate the landscape and find a professional who’s the right fit for your project. Don’t forget to download my free Professional Genealogist Evaluation template.
What Makes Someone a Professional Genealogist?
In Australia, a professional genealogist is simply someone who gets paid to do genealogy work. The definition is loose because the field isn’t regulated.
This means you’ll find genealogists with vastly different backgrounds, qualifications, and specialties. Some hold university degrees in history or related fields. Others are self-taught researchers with decades of experience. Others have a lot of enthusiasm but are still quite new to the field.
The key is finding someone whose skills match your specific needs.
When You Need Professional Help
You might benefit from hiring a genealogist if you:
Are just starting out and need guidance on research methods
Have hit a brick wall and don’t know what to do next
Need someone to review and verify your existing research
Want help creating a research plan that identifies the next steps
Require specialised skills or knowledge you don’t possess
Need access to resources you can’t reach
Don’t have enough time to do the work yourself
Need professional-looking documentation or reports.
What professionals can do for you:
They can review your evidence objectively and ensure everything has proper source citations. They’ll analyse your research, identify new leads, and create a targeted research plan to give your work direction.
Professional genealogists can fix errors in your family tree or help untangle conflicting information. They often have specialised knowledge in areas like DNA analysis, palaeography (reading old handwriting), foreign languages, or specific countries and time periods.
Many have access to resources you might not, such as international repositories or subscription databases. And they may have software that can produce customised reports and family tree charts.
How to Choose the Right Genealogist
Selecting a genealogist depends entirely on your project. You need the right fit for the job.
Experience is your most important criteria. Look for someone with sufficient experience in genealogy generally, plus expertise in areas relevant to your project. This includes:
Geographic specialisation (Irish records, Australian colonial records, etc.)
Time period expertise (18th century records, etc.)
Source type knowledge (land records, military records, passenger lists, etc.)
Non-university options include the Diploma of Family Historical Studies with the Society of Australian Genealogists and various online courses. Some Australian genealogists also study overseas through formal programs or short courses.
Professional memberships aren’t required but may indicate ongoing education and professional standards. Look for memberships in genealogy societies and professional groups.
Fees vary widely since the field is unregulated. If budget is a concern, explore single-person consultancies who may offer competitive rates while maintaining high standards.
Get quotes from multiple genealogists before deciding. Check their payment schedule.
Availability matters. Many professionals have waiting lists. Consider your timeline and any deadlines when making your choice.
Where to Find Professional Genealogists
Unfortunately, there’s no comprehensive directory of Australian genealogists. You’ll need to try several approaches.
Start with referrals. Personal recommendations from other researchers are valuable. Ask at your genealogy society or in online genealogy groups.
Try search engines or AI search tools, but remember these won’t give you a complete picture of available professionals.
Check professional organisations:
Society of Australian Genealogists maintains a list of Diplomats who have completed their Diploma and work professionally
Australasian Association of Genealogists and Record Agents (AAGRA) is often cited as the main professional body, but their member list is limited and many excellent genealogists aren’t members
International organisations may include some Australian members:
Association of Professional Genealogists (APG) in the USA
Association of Scottish Genealogists and Researchers in Archives (ASGRA) in Scotland
Association of Genealogists and Researchers in Archives (AGRA) in England and Wales
Register of Qualified Genealogists (RQG) is an international directory of genealogists with recognised qualifications. It’s based in England and includes professionals from the UK and worldwide, though it’s unclear how many Australians are registered.
Essential Tips for Success
Prepare thoroughly. Work out exactly what you need done. Pull together a document summarising what you already know. This helps genealogists understand your project and provide accurate quotes.
Communicate clearly. Talk through the project to refine tasks and expectations. Understand what will be done, timeframes, and what format the work will be delivered in.
Start small. If you haven’t worked with a genealogist before, consider doing a small project first. Some will be happy to carry out a preliminary investigation. This lets you test whether the project is viable and if you can work well together before committing to a larger engagement.
Get it in writing. Ensure you have a written contract or agreement with pricing. Read their terms and conditions carefully before signing.
Manage expectations. Professional genealogists can’t guarantee they’ll solve every mystery. Some brick walls remain standing despite the best efforts. Discuss realistic outcomes before starting.
Your Next Steps
Finding the right professional genealogist takes time and research. Start by clearly defining your project needs and budget. Then reach out to several genealogists who seem like good fits.
Remember, the cheapest option isn’t always the best value. Focus on finding someone whose experience and approach match your specific requirements.
With the right professional by your side, you’ll be amazed how your family history can progress.
Need help organising your research and choosing a genealogist? Download my free Professional Genealogist Evaluation Template to prepare your information effectively and make the best choice.
Danielle Lautrec is a genealogy educator, researcher, and author of The Good Genealogist. With qualifications in history, family history, and historical archaeology, she used to work as a professional genealogist and now teaches for the Society of Australian Genealogists.
Feature image: AI generated image of woman at desk, created using Flux schnell AI
Family history timelines are essential analytical tools that help genealogists solve research problems, not just document information. While genealogy software provides basic chronological views, Excel genealogy timelines give you the flexibility and analytical power needed for family tree research.
This complete guide shows you exactly how to build effective genealogy spreadsheets and family history timelines in Excel, with detailed instructions, real examples, and advanced tips that will transform how you approach genealogical analysis and family history research.
Why Excel Beats Other Genealogy Timeline Tools
Excel is the best timeline choice for analytical genealogy research:
Customisable workspace: Unlike family tree software, Excel lets you structure data exactly how your research problem demands. You control what information is included and how it is formatted.
Powerful sorting and filtering: Split complex family data across multiple columns, then sort or filter by any column, such as surname, location, event type, or date range. This analytical flexibility is crucial for research planning and hypothesis testing.
Integration with genealogy working documents: Include your family history timeline as a worksheet in your Excel research plan. Keep genealogy timelines, correspondence logs, and research notes in one workbook for easy access and improved productivity.
Direct source linking: Hyperlink timeline data directly to online records or files on your computer, so you can easily examine them when needed.
Visual pattern recognition: Use conditional formatting, colour coding, and custom layouts to spot patterns in the data, such as chronological gaps, and inconsistencies that text-based timelines miss.
Cost and accessibility: Use Excel free with most computers, shareable across platforms, and exportable to any format needed for publication or collaboration.
Tip: Conditional formatting helps make patterns and trends in your data more apparent. To use it, you create rules that determine the format of cells based on their values, such as cell colours tied to age of the individual.
When to Create an Excel Genealogy Timeline
Don’t create Excel timelines for routine family tree documentation. Use your genealogy software or online family tree for that.
Create genealogy timelines in Excel when you need analytical power:
Research problem solving: When testing specific genealogy research questions or hypotheses (like parentage questions), or working through chronological puzzles that require cross-referencing multiple people and locations in your family tree.
Project management: For long-term research projects, such as one-place studies or multi-generational studies where you need to track interconnected events.
Case study development: When preparing presentations, publications, or teaching materials that require clean, customisable visual timelines.
Master family overview: When you need a comprehensive genealogy timeline covering your entire family tree. Use filters to focus on specific family lines, time periods, or geographical areas as your research demands.
Family History Timeline Structure
Chronology is the underlying structure, so place your dates in the first one or two columns. Each row represents one event.
Essential columns:
Date (Year column for sorting, plus another column for the full date if needed)
Name (Individual’s full name)
Surname (Separate column for filtering)
Event (Birth, marriage, census, land purchase, etc.)
Place (Location of event)
Additional columns:
Unique identifier number (For the Individual, from your family history software)
Age (At time of the event)
Source (Citation or reference)
Notes (Your analysis and observations)
Context (Historical events)
Step-by-Step Excel Timeline Creation Process
Step 1: Design Your Column Structure
Start with essential columns, then add additional columns based on your research question and needs:
| Year | Full Date | Surname | Full Name | Event | Place | Source | Notes |
Apply bold formatting to headers and freeze the top row for easy navigation as your timeline grows.
The freeze panes button is on the View tab. Click the drop-down arrow and select Freeze Top Row.
Step 2: Set Up Excel Features
Enable AutoFilter: Select your header row and apply filters to every column. This is crucial for analytical work.
Handling Pre-1900 Date Problems: Excel does not support dates before January 1, 1900, which affects most genealogical research. Solutions:
Text format approach: Format your date column as text and enter dates as “15 Mar 1847”. You lose automatic chronological sorting but improve accuracy.
Separate column method: Create columns for Day, Month, and Year. You can sort by year easily, and by month within year when needed.
Dual date system: Use a “Year” column (number format) for sorting, plus a “Full Date” column (text format) for complete information.
Add data validation: Create dropdown lists for common event types, such as birth, death and marriage, to ensure consistency across large timelines.
Find the Data Validation button on the Data tab, shown here far right.
Step 3: Enter Your Data Systematically
Start with your sources: Check your sources and create events from them, not from your family tree. This helps you verify the accuracy of the information.
Use consistent terminology: Standardise place names, event descriptions, and name formats. This consistency is essential for effective filtering and analysis.
Include gaps: Note when someone is absent from expected records, records are not available or other gaps that may provide crucial analytical insights.
Add FFANS: Don’t limit your timeline to biological family. Include events for other people, if they are relevant to your research question.
Add historical context: Include relevant historical events, such as wars, epidemics, economic changes, and legal reforms. Use a different colour or formatting, or apply a filter to hide them when not needed.
Step 4: Format for Analysis
Colour coding: Use colour to highlight patterns and assist your analysis. For example, use blue text to highlight name changes, and red for conflicting or questionable information.
Conditional formatting: Highlight cells based on criteria relevant to your research question. For example, if you are trying to identify the biological father of a child you could colour code the cells in the men’s columns based on their age when the child was born: green for a feasible age, red for too young or too old.
What Events to Include in a Genealogy Timeline
Your timeline should support your research question or hypothesis. Choose events that place the person in a particular place at a particular time, and add events that supply useful information for your question.
Include:
Direct evidence: Events that your research subjects directly participated in, such as birth, death and marriage.
Indirect evidence: Such as events of FFANs that help establish context or provide other relevant information, such as the births of siblings.
Contextual events: Historical events potentially relevant to the subject.
Case Study: Testing Parentage with Timeline Analysis
Research Question: Are John Shaw and Lydia Matthews the parents of Sophia Webb, born between 1831-1845?
Timeline Strategy: Create events showing locations of all three people from 1830-1850 to test whether the hypothesis is feasible.
Example of a simple timeline for a case study
Analysis Result: Timeline revealed Sophia was unlikely to have been born before 1834, as she required parental consent to marry in 1855 and had a child in 1880. It also revealed that it was feasible that John Shaw was her father. Note, this case study is a real case study from my family, but has been simplified for the purpose of this blog post.
Advanced Timeline Techniques
Managing Complex Multi-Family Data
Use surname filtering: When working with multiple families, the surname column becomes essential for isolating specific family lines while maintaining the analytical power of a single worksheet.
Create analytical groupings: Add a “Group” or “Family” column to categorise events by research focus, such as immediate family, collateral lines, associated individuals, or groups such as convicts.
Employ consistent naming: Use standardised formats for names throughout the timeline, to help with sorting and filtering. For example, “Smith, John” rather than mixing “John Smith” and “Smith, John” formats.
Linking Sources and Documents
Transform your timeline into a research database by linking directly to sources containing your evidence:
Local file links: Link to PDFs, images, or documents stored on your computer.
Online source links: Link directly to database records, digitised documents, or research repositories. Include stable URLs when possible.
Citation integration: Use your source column for short citations, with full citations maintained in a separate worksheet or external document.
Visual Analysis Techniques
Colour Coding Strategies
By person: Assign each individual a colour to track their movements and events across time.
By evidence quality: Green for reliable evidence, yellow for insufficient evidence, red for conflicting or questionable information. See my Tree Health Assessment Toolfor another example of this approach.
By geographical area: Use colours to represent different counties, states, or countries, making movement patterns immediately visible.
Conditional Formatting for Pattern Recognition
Date range highlighting: Highlight events outside expected chronological parameters, such as marriage under the age of consent.
Location analysis: Colour-code events that occur in unexpected places for your research subjects, such as a child born in a different location to its siblings.
Gap identification: Use formatting to highlight periods with unusually few events, suggesting missing evidence or research opportunities.
Timeline Maintenance and Growth
Adding New Information
Insert rows systematically: Add new events by inserting rows in chronological order. Or, if you prefer to append new events at the end of the timeline, don’t forget to re-sort by year to correct the chronology.
Update source links: When you acquire better sources or digital copies, update links and citations.
Refine analytical columns: As your research evolves, adjust colour-coding, notes, and contextual information to reflect new insights. If you prefer to keep previous versions, copy your timeline onto a new worksheet in the same file and use the new tab for the new version.
Template creation: Develop timeline templates so that you don’t need to start from scratch each time.
Sharing and Collaboration
Version control: Use clear file naming conventions when sharing timelines with research partners.
Format for export: When preparing timelines for publication, hide analytical columns (notes, personal observations) and any private information. Note that Excel files can be adjusted to fit to page before printing or saving as a PDF, so check if your timeline can fit.
When printing an Excel spreadsheet, use the Scaling button to fit rows or columns on the page
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Inconsistent formatting: Standardise names, places, and event descriptions from the beginning. Inconsistency destroys the analytical power of filtering and sorting.
Ignoring historical context: Timelines without historical context miss crucial explanatory factors for family decisions and movements.
Poor source documentation: Timeline analysis is only as good as your evidence. Check and analyse the details and the evidence. Create clear source citations for every event.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Do I really need Excel if my genealogy software already has timelines?
A: Software timelines are great for basic chronology, but Excel timelines are research tools. Use Excel when you need to gather information about multiple people, analyse patterns, or test specific hypotheses. Think of software timelines as documentation; Excel timelines as investigation.
Q: How do I handle dates before 1900 in Excel?
A: Use text formatting for your date column (enter as “15 Mar 1847”) or create separate Day/Month/Year columns. For sorting, add a separate “Year” column formatted as numbers. This dual approach gives you both flexibility and analytical power.
Q: Should I create separate timelines for each ancestor or one master timeline?
A: Start with a worksheet containing all relevant people, then use filters to focus on individuals or families. This approach maximises Excel’s analytical capabilities and often reveals connections you’d miss with separate timelines.
Q: What’s the minimum number of events needed for effective analysis?
A: Quality matters more than quantity. Even ten strategically chosen events can solve research problems if they address your specific question. Focus on events that help test your hypothesis, although creating comprehensive life histories could be useful too, if you are writing their stories.
Q: Can I link my timeline to digital documents and online sources?
A: Absolutely. Use Excel’s hyperlink feature to connect timeline events directly to PDF documents, online database records, or local files. This transforms your timeline into a research database, and helps maintain the link between the event and the evidence.
Q: How do I share timelines with research partners who don’t have Excel?
A: Export to CSV format for universal compatibility, save as PDF for presentation purposes, or use Excel Online for shared editing. Consider creating a simplified version for sharing while maintaining your full analytical version.
Q: What if my timeline becomes too large and unwieldy?
A: Use Excel’s filtering and column-hiding features rather than breaking it into multiple sheets. Group related events, use colour coding, and consider creating summary views for different research focuses while maintaining one comprehensive dataset.
Conclusion
Excel timelines are essential for taking a systematic and analytical approach to genealogy research. They help you conduct a more comprehensive investigation and reveal patterns that may not be visible in family tree charts. The key to an effective analytical timeline lies in strategically selecting individuals and events that support your research questions. Use Excel timelines to support evidence-based conclusions that progress your family history research.
Ready to get started? Create a timeline and try the techniques described here with your own research challenge.
Danielle Lautrec is a genealogy educator, researcher, and author of The Good Genealogist. With qualifications in history, family history, and historical archaeology, she teaches for the Society of Australian Genealogists.
What if future genealogists discovered a beautiful photograph of your great-great-grandmother in your family archive, only to learn decades later that it was a fake? As AI-generated images become increasingly sophisticated and accessible, family historians face an unprecedented challenge: how do we harness this powerful storytelling tool without compromising the historical integrity that lies at the heart of our work?
Disclaimer: The information in this article is general and should not be relied on as legal advice.
AI-generated images are new images created by a machine based on training data and a text prompt provided by a user. Images can be in a variety of styles, ranging from ones that look like real photographs, to paintings and line drawings. There are significant advantages in using AI-generated images for family history, but the use also raises complex issues that we need to navigate carefully.
This article focuses on responsible use of AI-generated images, not image creation techniques.
Why use AI-generated images in family history?
Images are powerful tools for storytelling. They can enhance your family history narratives, illustrate imagined scenes, and create reconstructions of places your family lived or events they participated in.
Genealogists sometimes use AI to generate images of what their ancestors may have looked like. This is particularly valuable when you don’t have photographs of your ancestors.
AI-generated images are especially useful for periods before the invention of photography, or where historical photographs are simply not available. They can bring historical contexts to life in ways that text alone cannot achieve.
Understanding legal and ethical considerations
Using AI-generated images does not appear to result in copyright violations under Australian law. While the training data used by AI models may include works protected by copyright, it remains unclear whether laws have been broken by this process. The AI tool itself cannot own copyright.
Despite this legal position, many living artists object to their works being used to train AI without consent or compensation. [1]
This raises important ethical considerations for us as users of AI models. We need to consider the impact on creative communities when we choose to use these tools.
The general consensus in Australia is that you may hold copyright in an AI-generated image if you contributed sufficient creative input. There is no definitive answer to how much contribution is enough, but it would presumably require more than using a simple text prompt. [2]
Making AI images your own through creative input
One way to address both copyright and ethical concerns is to contribute significant creative input to your AI-generated images.
You can do this by:
Describing specific elements to include when you ask AI to generate an image, rather than referencing copyrighted works
Requesting general styles instead of specific artists or brands (for example, ‘impressionist style’ rather than ‘Monet-style’)
Using your own photographs as reference material for the AI
Modifying outputs using image editing tools like Canva or Photoshop.
Example: I recently created this AI-generated watercolour of a Cotswold church by uploading my own photograph as reference material. I was experimenting with AI as an artistic tool. Because this was just a decorative image for Instagram rather than historical documentation, I added a simple caption acknowledging that it was AI-generated. No source citation was needed in this context.
Creating historically accurate and appropriate images
Accuracy and authenticity are fundamental principles in family history. This principle must extend to images as well as written documentation.
When creating AI-generated images based on historical evidence:
If available, provide the AI with reference photographs showing period clothing, building styles, and actual locations
Include descriptions from reliable historical sources as part of your text prompts
Cross-check important details such as weather patterns, terrain, and cultural customs
Be aware of potential anachronisms that AI might introduce
Consider consulting historical experts when recreating specific time periods or events.
Remember that AI models do not understand context the way humans do. They might combine elements from different time periods inappropriately.
Photo restoration versus image creation
AI tools can also enhance or restore damaged historical photographs. This is generally excellent for preservation purposes. However, integrity must still be maintained.
When using AI for photo restoration:
Clearly document what has been restored or enhanced
Keep the original unaltered version
Be transparent about the extent of AI involvement
Consider whether restored elements are based on evidence or speculation.
The same principles of attribution and transparency that apply to entirely AI-generated images also apply to AI-enhanced historical photographs.
When and how to disclose AI use
There is no legal obligation in Australia to indicate that AI was used to generate an image. However, you may choose to do so for transparency and to maintain trust with your audience.
The key question is: what are the potential consequences if someone was not aware that the image was AI-generated?
For decorative illustrations used on social media, disclosure might be as simple as a caption overlay. However, if you’re creating what appears to be a photograph of an ancestor, the implications are significant. As family historians, we are creating historical records. It is crucial that they be identified accurately.
Context determines the level of attribution needed. Over-attribution can be unnecessary and distracting. Under-attribution can be misleading and potentially harmful to historical accuracy.
How to label AI-generated images
For transparency, images used in formal family history documentation should be accompanied by appropriate captions and source citations.
See my example, below. You could also include the text prompt used and the name of the AI model, but this is optional.
AI-generated image of a Thames waterman (Lautrec, Danielle, ‘A 19th century Thames waterman rowing three people in a skiff on the River Thames, inspired by contemporary paintings’, AI-generated image, [optional: include the AI model] January 2025.)
The citation format follows advice from the Arts Law Centre of Australia that copyright law only recognises the human creator, not AI, as the author.
Since images can become separated from their captions, consider adding a watermark or text overlay indicating AI generation for important historical images. You can also include that information in the alt-text for online images.
Organising and managing your AI-generated files
The last thing you want as a family historian is to forget that an image you created was not genuine. Prevent this problem by using file naming systems that clearly identify AI-generated content.
Examples:
PollardFarmhouse_MadronCornwall_1860_AI.jpg
AI_PollardFarmhouse_MadronCornwall_1860.jpg (groups AI files together alphabetically)
Include AI-generation information in image metadata as well. This creates multiple safeguards against future confusion.
Evaluating AI-generated images from others
Family historians must always analyse the authenticity and reliability of sources. This has become even more critical with AI-generated content becoming widespread.
Only use images with reliable provenance. If you use an AI-generated image that someone else produced, include the original caption and source citation. Don’t assume that undocumented images are genuine historical photographs.
Develop skills in spotting AI-generated images. Look for telltale signs like unusual textures, inconsistent lighting, or anatomical irregularities.
Conclusion
AI-generated images offer exciting opportunities for family history research and storytelling. They can bring our ancestors’ worlds to life in unprecedented ways.
However, with this power comes responsibility. We must use these tools ethically, transparently, and with full consideration for their impact on artistic communities and historical integrity.
The key is thoughtful application. Consider your purpose, your audience, and the potential consequences of your choices. When in doubt, err on the side of transparency and proper attribution.
By following these principles, we can harness the benefits of AI while maintaining the trust and accuracy that are fundamental to good family history practice.
More information
For more of my articles on documenting your family history, go to the Document page.
Your ancestors’ lives span decades and centuries, but family trees charts cannot adequately capture the chronology of their experiences. Genealogy timelines enrich family history research, revealing how historical events shaped your family’s journey, and uncovering patterns that traditional charts miss entirely.
Genealogy timeline tools range from basic spreadsheet templates to sophisticated diagramming software. The variety of timeline tools can overwhelm researchers trying to choose the right solution.
This comparison cuts through the confusion, evaluating seven leading tools across two crucial categories: creating beautiful illustrative timelines for sharing your discoveries, and building powerful analytical timelines for serious genealogical research.
Please note: This article reflects my personal opinions based on my experience. Your preferences may differ depending on your research style, budget and familiarity with software.
First, consider the purpose of your timeline and your audience
Before choosing a tool, think about what you want to achieve with your timeline. Ask yourself: is your timeline for illustration or analysis?
Illustrative timelines are used to clearly display or summarise information. They are useful for presentations, reports or sharing with family.
Analytical timelines help you test hypotheses, identify inconsistencies and evaluate evidence. They are useful for research planning, DNA analysis and problem solving.
Your choice of a timeline tool also depends on your audience. Family and friends will probably prefer illustrative timelines, while analytical timelines are more suited to other genealogists.
The right timeline tool depends on your goals, audience, budget and comfort with software. Here is my comparison, to help you make your decision.
Quick overview: Timeline tools at a glance
Tool
Best for
Cost
Complexity level
Spreadsheets
Deep analysis, data comparison
Free
Low-Medium
Notion
Research planning, linked notes
Free/Paid
Medium
SmartArt
Quick simple illustrations
Free with Office
Low
SmartDraw
Basic diagrams
Paid
Medium
Visio
Custom diagrams
Paid
Medium-Difficult
Lucidchart
Professional illustrations
Paid
Medium
Family history software
Individual timelines
Free/Paid
Low
Comparison of timeline tools
Spreadsheets, such as Excel, Airtable & Google Sheets
Best for: Deep analysis, sorting, filtering, comparisons
Assessment: Spreadsheets are one of the best tools for genealogy timelines. They allow detailed, flexible analysis using features like sorting, filtering and hiding columns. The formatting features allow you to illustrate your timeline in different views. You can use built-in templates or build from scratch. Easily modified and you can store multiple timelines on different worksheets within a spreadsheet.
Learning curve: Low-Medium. You only need to learn a few features and basic formatting
Availability: Free with Microsoft Office; Airtable has a free plan; Google Sheets is free with a Google account
Verdict: Ideal for analytical tasks. Handles a lot of data. Familiar and powerful, while still being quite simple to use.
Extract from an analytical timeline in Excel, containing information about when my family lines arrived in Australia
Notion
Best for: Master timelines, linking events to research notes and research plans
Assessment: Notion uses databases, making it a flexible tool for capturing timeline data with context. It’s not designed for diagrams, but the table view can be customised to show events by person, place, or date. Data can easily be rearranged using sorting and filtering.
Availability: Free for individuals; paid plans for teams
Verdict: Excellent if you already use Notion for research notes and research planning. Less suited to complex analytical tasks.
SmartArt (Word & PowerPoint)
Best for: Simple illustrative timelines
Assessment: SmartArt is a quick way to create basic timelines. You just insert a Process diagram into Word or PowerPoint. Limited in customisation and not suited to analysis, but perfect for simple illustrative timelines.
Learning curve: Low
Availability: Free with Microsoft Office
Verdict: Handy for quick visuals and beginner-friendly.
Simple illustrative timeline created using SmartArt
SmartDraw
Best for: Simple illustrative diagrams and bar charts (Gantt-style, showing the duration of an event)
Assessment: Offers horizontal and table formats, with templates for quick setup. You can customise text, colours, and add images. Suited for illustrative purposes, not complex analytical timelines. Produces good quality images for inclusion in presentations or reports.
Learning curve: Medium, but easier if you are familiar with the software or similar tools
Verdict: Suitable for presentations. Subscription cost is hard to justify if timelines are your only use.
Visio
Best for: Simple illustrative flowcharts and diagrams, including timelines
Assessment: The desktop version is more customisable than SmartDraw. Like SmartDraw, you can customise text, colours, and add images. Suited for illustrative purposes, not complex analytical timelines.
Learning curve: More difficult than SmartDraw
Availability: Basic version included with Microsoft 365 business; full version is a paid app
Verdict: A mid-tier option—more flexible than SmartArt, less than Excel or Lucidchart. Good if you already have access.
Lucidchart
Best for: Both illustrative and analytical timelines, where customisation is important
Assessment: Offers vertical, horizontal, Gantt and bar chart timeline templates. Highly customisable with colour coding, shapes and labels. Strong contender for both illustrative and analytical needs.
Learning curve: Medium. Learning the features and processes takes a little while, but step-by-step instructions are provided
Verdict: One of the most versatile options. Worth if you need complex visuals or also want to create family tree diagrams. Easy to insert a Lucidchart into a Word document or PowerPoint presentation.
Example of a simple illustrative timeline in Lucidchart. Many more formats are available.
Family history software
Best for: Simple timelines for an individual, not requiring customisation
Assessment: Limited to events of an individual within the context of their immediate family. Very little customisation available. Easy to incorporate into a report generated by the software.
Learning curve: None, the timeline is generated automatically as you enter data to your family tree
Availability: Included in all family history software. Some, such as Legacy Family Tree, are free.
Verdict: Very useful for day-to-day research and simple illustrative timelines in reports. Limited value for complex analysis.
Example of a timeline in Legacy Family Tree Software. Tip: Change to Report style then copy and paste the data into a spreadsheet if you want to add or amend the data.
Final thoughts
From my experience, three tools emerge as the clear winners for different genealogy scenarios. Spreadsheets excel at analytical work. Their sorting, filtering, and comparison capabilities make them the most powerful choice for serious research. Lucidchart takes the stands out for visual presentation, offering professional-quality timelines to enrich your family history. For quick, everyday use, SmartArt provides the perfect balance of simplicity and effectiveness.
My recommendation? Start with Excel to build your analytical skills and understanding of timeline creation. Once you’re comfortable with the fundamentals, add Lucidchart for when you need to create impressive visuals for sharing. This two-tool approach covers 90% of genealogy timeline needs while keeping costs reasonable and learning curves manageable.
If you think timelines are just for visualising a sequence of events, you’re overlooking one of the most powerful genealogy research tools. A genealogy timeline is more than a list of dates. It’s a framework for understanding your family history.
By placing people in time and space, timelines help clarify identities, expose gaps and inconsistencies, and reveal patterns. These insights can significantly improve the quality of your family history.
In this article, I show how genealogy timelines can help you:
Organise complex information
Improve research accuracy
Plan future research
Solve difficult genealogical problems
Compare data and evaluate relationships
Add historical context to family stories
Write clearer and more engaging narratives.
Use timelines to organise and analyse genealogy information
Genealogy generates a lot of data. Timelines bring order by organising information chronologically and geographically, making it easier to see relationships and patterns.
You can easily integrate new information and retrieve it later. This helps you understand your family history more deeply and reduces the risk of overlooking key connections.
Use timelines to improve the accuracy of your family history
The chronological structure of a timeline highlights inconsistencies, such as a person being in two places at once, or multiple versions of an event when there should be only one. These errors often remain hidden in family tree charts but become obvious in a timeline.
A timeline showing multiple baptisms in different locations indicates that the evidence has not been sufficiently analysed to determine which event was the correct one.
Use timelines to plan your research
Whether you’re investigating ancestors in the 1800s or analysing DNA matches today, timelines help you spot gaps, formulate focused research questions, and compare life events across individuals and families. These strategies form the basis of effective timeline analysis in genealogy.
Timelines summarise the key events in a person’s life and highlight periods with little or no data. This helps you spot where you may have missing family members, such as children whose birth records you have not discovered, or identify when and where a family moved. These provide clues to progress your research.
Analysing a timeline can help you:
Identify new research leads
Develop hypotheses to be tested
Formulate focused research questions.
A timeline in Excel shows a gap in the birth years of children which may suggest a missing child requiring further investigation.
Use timelines to solve problems and test hypotheses
Timelines clarify inconsistencies and support hypothesis testing. If you’re trying to demonstrate that someone was in the right place at the right time, a timeline can provide the structure to support or refute that claim.
Example:
A DNA case involved identifying the unknown biological father of a test taker’s father. Analysis of DNA evidence pointed to a family with eight brothers. A timeline based on documentary evidence compared their locations and ages at the time of conception, which helped narrow down the candidates.
Use timelines to compare and analyse relationships
You can include multiple individuals on a single timeline to compare life events, identify patterns and assess possible relationships. This can help confirm family links, or reveal mistaken connections.
Example:
A mother was listed in family trees as giving birth at age 50 and issuing memorial notices about her husband, after the date she was supposed to have died! A timeline revealed that two families had been mistakenly merged due to identical parent names.
Use timelines to document evidence
Timelines can supplement written analysis in an evidence summary or evidence argument (aka proof summary or proof argument). Organising your findings chronologically strengthens the logic of your case and helps readers understand the reasoning behind your conclusions.
Use timelines to provide historical and family context
Timelines place your family’s events within the broader context of historical events, communities and extended families. This can provide clues to motivations or influences, or explain significant life changes such as migration, enlistment, or death due to a prevalent illness or famine.
Example:
A timeline of sons’ births overlaid with World War I dates highlighted why certain young men were absent—they had gone to war.
Use timelines as visual and summary tools
Timelines are ideal for summarising a life story at a glance. They can be shared with family members or other researchers and used as reference tools during research.
A simple timeline graphic from my book, The Good Genealogist, summarises key life events in a visually accessible way.
Use timelines to write your family stories
When writing, a timeline provides a narrative scaffold. It helps ensure chronological accuracy and can stimulate story ideas by highlighting connections between events and people.
Get started using timelines
From simple life summaries to advanced analysis using tools like Excel or Notion, genealogy timelines should be a standard feature of your family history research toolkit.
Tip
What to include in a genealogy timeline for effective family history research:
Dates
Places
People
Events
(optional) Source citations, Historical events, Research notes.
