webtrees
Webtrees is the web's leading online collaborative genealogy application.
Activity has dropped noticeably. Check the repository before committing to it.
Commit activity more than 63% of tracked projects; popularity more than 31%. How this is calculated.
Commits, last 11 months
| Stars | 824 |
|---|---|
| Latest release | 1.7.2 · 5 Dec 2016 |
| Repo updated | 27 Sept 2026 |
| Licence | GPL-3.0 |
| Built with | PHP |
Is webtrees actively maintained?
Development is ongoing. The repository recorded 489 commits over the same window, and the last three months alone account for 278 of them.
Activity is accelerating: the last quarter carried 356% more commits than the one before it.
The last tagged release, 1.7.2, is over 9 years old. If you deploy, expect to build from the default branch rather than a stable tag.
webtrees ranks #4 of 5 tracked genealogy projects. Several better-maintained options exist in the same category — they are listed below.
What webtrees actually does
Webtrees is an online collaborative genealogy application that runs on your own server. It allows multiple users to manage family trees, store historical records, and build shared ancestral databases through a web browser. The software is written in PHP and provides a structured interface for tracking lineage data.
Best fit: It is a suitable choice if you want to host your own family history research collaboratively and maintain full ownership of your genealogical data.
Worth knowing: The codebase has a stagnant release history, meaning you may encounter unpatched bugs or compatibility issues with newer PHP versions. Maintenance activity has slowed significantly.
Deployment notes
You will typically need a standard LAMP or LEMP stack with a persistent database such as MySQL or MariaDB. Ensure you configure persistent storage for uploaded media files and place the application behind a reverse proxy to handle TLS termination.
Alternatives to webtrees
Projects in the same categories, ordered by health score.
Genealogy software that can be used offline or as a Web service.
Web app for collaborative genealogy, based on and interoperable with Gramps, the open source genealogy desktop application.
Record family members and their relationships and build a family tree.
Genealogy tool designed with privacy in mind that anyone can use to author or edit their family tree. Data is stored in the GEDCOM format and all processing is done in the browser.