23andMe and Ancestry DNA both test your DNA and compare it with those of other people in the world. They can also determine any relatives you might have in their system and can respectively tell you about ancestral data.

With Ancestry, that presents itself in the form of genealogical records and estimates on record matches for your family tree. With a service called ThruLines, they can also provide estimates of which common ancestors connect you to your DNA matches.

For 23andMe, it means testing your paternal or maternal heritage depending on your gender, which may reveal migration patterns in those lines. 23andMe also shows an estimate of the genetic make-up of your parents, great-grandparents, and beyond. An example of such a result would be along the lines of "we estimate that either your third great-grandparent or fourth grandparent was 100% Scandinavian." This is something my results actually revealed to me.

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