The Family Tree Registry is a free resource facilitating the exchange of genealogical information while maintaining the privacy of its users and their family trees. The Registry does not contain family trees. Instead, it functions as a central repository of descriptive information about family trees (including where to find them) and surnames appearing on them (but not about individuals). In other words, you won't put your aunt Betty's name online, but other genealogists will still be able to know whether your family tree interests them, and, if so, they will be able to contact you through the Registry, without seeing your email address (if you choose to keep it private).

The Family Tree Registry also functions as a search engine, enabling users to find family trees by specifying properties the trees or surnames on the trees must possess. Properties such as ethnicity/sub-ethnicity, religion/sub-religion, place, date last modified, whether surnames or family trees contain nobility, whether they have associated DNA (genetic) information, and more are searchable. Surnames and places can also be specified and searched according to their native spelling in non-Latin characters (Chinese, Hebrew, Russian, etc.).

When logged in, searches you perform can be saved so that you can easily retry them in the future, without having to respecify the search parameters.

The Family Tree Registry is not limited in scope to family trees that are available online. You can also register family trees that are privately maintained offline, that are published in books, or that can be found in repositories. For example, the Genealogical Society of X can use the Registry to tell the world that it has a family tree covering certain surnames, ethnicities, places, dates, etc., and that it can be found at the Society's headquarters, without having to post the contents of the tree online. There is a Bulk Registration feature enabling repositories to quickly and easily register their collections of family trees. Or, if in your genealogical research you have encountered a rare out-of-print book that contains a family tree, you can use the Registry to make other genealogists aware of that tree's existence and location.

The Family Tree Registry also contains the Peer-Reviewed Genealogy Link List, a list of links that can be sorted by rating of usefulness in specific areas of genealogy. What makes this link list unique and peer-reviewed is that the ratings are supplied by people who have registered family trees pertaining to the corresponding areas. For example, ratings in the area of Basque genealogy are supplied by people who have registered family trees with the dominant ethnicity Basque.

Much of the functionality of the Family Tree Registry is unique among major genealogy websites, and additional capabilities are planned. If you have any suggestions of ways to improve the Registry, please contact us.

The Family Tree Registry was opened in October 2005 by Logan Joseph Kleinwaks, a hobbyist genealogist.