Reunion family tree software pc

Family Tree Maker provides all of the features that you would expect from a genealogy program, and it does most of them very well. The latest version of Family Tree Maker added a unique feature called FamilySync, which lets you automatically synchronize up to three family trees.

This is perfect if you have relatives who are working on the same tree as you. Any information you enter gets added to their trees, and vice versa. They have also added the ability to color code your ancestors with up to eight different colors each. This can be used to help you keep track of your research status, easily see which children were by a first wife or second wife, or any other use you can think of. Family Tree Maker also includes a lightweight built-in image editor so you can make simple changes to enhance any photos connected to your family tree.

The program connects easily to both the Ancestry and FamilySearch websites, allowing you to download records directly into your tree. It also provides extensive hints on places to search for more records when you are connected to the internet. FTM is one of very few programs that now allows you to include same-sex marriages in your family tree. On the negative side, while Family Tree Maker does offer an improved set of charts and reports, the charts are still not as extensive as Legacy 9.

Because it has been around for so long and is used by so many people, Family Tree Maker has a wealth of online support in the form of tips, step by step instructions and tutorials, and even how-to videos. While all this support is great in most cases, be aware that Family Tree Maker has changed a lot over the years, so some of that support might be out of date. Still, there are so many users out there that you can always find a forum to ask questions and get expert answers quickly.

For years, Family Tree Maker has allowed you to connect with Ancestry to upload your family tree and to directly download records from Ancestry into your tree.

That means you can easily connect and share with the two largest genealogy sites out there with billions of online records available. There is no free trial available. Legacy 9, also known as Legacy Family Tree 9, is a fully featured genealogy program that is considered by many to be the best on the market today.

Legacy 9 provides everything you would expect, plus a lot of neat extras that are new in the latest edition. One powerful tool is the compare two people tool, which lets you examine two people side by side. The side by side display lets you check them out easily rather than having to keep flipping back and forth. Legacy 9 has the most extensive and in most cases best looking set of charts out of any genealogy program.

In addition to printed reports, Legacy 9 has built-in support to turn your family tree into a webpage automatically. It also has a built-in web browser so you can check out online sites without having to switch back and forth between windows.

Here are the links to their overview videos:. I publish step-by-step, how-to videos on this site. Sign up for my email list so I can drop you a note when I publish new articles and videos. See it? I find navigating my family file much easier with the tree view! And the sidebar makes common tasks like citing an existing source easier.

Loading an older family file in Reunion 10 will not mess up your version 9 family files. A new copy is automatically created when you load the file and you are given the opportunity to save it with a different name.

Reunion 10 uses the existing Application Support folder where they are stored. You can keep older versions on your Mac because Reunion 10 is installed as a new application leaving your existing applications untouched. If you buy it through my Amazon. It has no ability to link multimedia to a citation and has no facility to store citation specific source quality ratings. To make matters worse, when importing citations in GEDCOM files it ignores these two record types without warning leading to data loss.

Sign up for my email list so I can notify you when I publish new articles and videos about Reunion. Neither of us wants that! Reunion 10 installs just like other Mac software. Follow the directions that come with the package. Back up your family files before you open them with the new version. See How to Backup a Reunion 9 Family file or one of these videos from the article.

Please upgrade your browser to the latest version. Why not Reunion? Biggest Pro: Changeable lay-outs of screens and reports. Ability to define new events and facts. Mac only I like to use PCs, too. Biggest Con: Price to upgrade! The book creation which produces a pdf version which is not editable with a word processor.

I just updated to the latest version Reunion 12 and love all the additional features. More charts, enhanced web site generation, book creation, as well as more ability to manage the basic data. The addition of ReunionTouch for carrying and updating files on mobile devices is also fantastic.

Biggest Pro: Easy to use; Excellent support; Fully fills every need; user friendly. I used it many years ago and liked it; then went to a Windows program for several years. It seemed to me that what was great 10 years ago had not kept up with improvements in software. Have been using Reunion for many years since owning a Mac computer, very user friendly and enjoyable to work through, you can see pairs and families at a glance and add items very quickly.

Reunion has been the number program for the Mac for many years and when I used it several years ago, I loved it.

Then I had to switch to Windows and switched software for several years. When I came back to Reunion I was not able to do things that I thought should be intuitive, e. I asked about it in the user group, describing the window software to illustrate what I meant and lobbied for a change. I ruffled feathers in the process sorry, leisterpro and was told to stop requesting that feature and use another program if that was what I wanted.

So I switched to another program and stopped bothering them. Because it was the go-to program for Macs for many years, many of their users are VERY familiar with the program and have no trouble remembering the various steps you must take to accomplish something.

The support is great. The people at Leister show a lot of wisdom in the development of the software. I never expect to use any other program. My original reunion from was good. Now I find that I can no longer add any new data. I can add the data but the program does not retain it. The data entry is efficient, and the charting capabilities are comprehensive. Reunion performed almost perfectly with the two large records, as did many other programs, but it faltered on the two smaller, but problematic records.

If it found a relationship to be problematic for the software, such as a same-sex marriage, it not only excluded that relationship from the pedigree but skipped every successive name as well. In addition, it missed some media files for several people, and in one case it attached media files to the wrong person.

The interface received an A for ease of use. Unlike most genealogy programs, Reunion displays the main toolbar vertically, along the left, rather than across the top. The only strike against Reunion on ease of use is the lack of a Windows version.

Some features and settings are only accessible through the menu bar across the top, separate from the main program. The software scored an A for data entry efficiency. It took me a total of seven minutes to enter the data for 10 individuals, compared with 12 to 14 minutes for most of the other genealogy programs I tested. Reunion has some of the best charting capabilities available. The charts lack the variety and style offered by Heredis , but their printable quality is a sharp contrast to that of most genealogy software charts.

I especially liked the fan charts. They provide color coding to mark family lines, and the boxes have soft corners with subtle shading.