Help:Basic Searches

Anyone may search for articles in the FamilySearch Research Wiki. You only need to be registered to edit an article. This article will provide some helpful hints on efficiently searching the Wiki.

How Search Works

 * Keywords, Search the FamilySearch Wiki the same way you would search Wikipedia, by keywords like DAR or Daughters of the American Revolution.
 * Not Phrases, You will not receive the best results if your searches include phrases like "How do I find records for the DAR," are used to search the FamilySearch Wiki. Phrases can be used to search both Google and Yahoo but the Wiki search engine is not designed for this type of search.
 * Enter the place, subject, record type or the name of the article in the search box. (Family names and information on specific families are not found on the FamilySearch Wiki. Go to FamilySearch to look for your deceased family members. Go to Forums to ask questions about your family history research.)

The FamilySearch Wiki search engine locates the keywords in Wiki article headings, titles, and in the content of the article. The resulting articles may contain one or all of the keywords searched. Articles containing the keywords many times throughout the article will rank higher in the search results than those that contain the search terms once or twice.

Step-by-step Search Instructions
Watch a video demonstration of how to search for articles.

Use the following steps to search for articles on localities or topics in the Wiki.


 * 1) Locate the "search box."
 * 2) Type the keywords, search terms, or the title of the article you want to find into the search box. You do not have to enter the exact title of the article. For example, you may type "United States census" or "New York City birth records."
 * 3) Click the Search button.
 * 4) After clicking the Search button, a list of search results will appear.
 * 5) Shown below, the number of results is displayed for the search. To see more results than those shown on the first page, click on Next 20 or 20, 50, 100, 250 or 500.[[Image:Search results.jpg|frame|center]]

Locate the title of the article you want to read and click on it.

To return to the previous page and select another article, click the back button on your Internet browser.

Remember:


 * Results with keywords in the Article Titles will always be listed first.
 * Results with keywords in the body of the article will be listed next.