QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
The interactive family tree, answered.
What it is, which TVs it works on, how your tree gets on screen, and what the free tier includes.
Start here
Getting Started
A family tree you explore rather than just look at. On Bright Branches, you move through your tree with a TV remote — choose any person and the tree turns and re-centers around them, parents above and descendants below. It's the difference between a framed chart and a living one.
Yes — that's the whole idea. Bright Branches is built natively for Apple TV, Android TV, Google TV, and Fire TV, with an iPad companion app. It's the only family tree experience designed for television.
Yes — the interactive tree runs in your browser, with no account and no card. It's the same experience that runs on the television.
No, and that's on purpose. Bright Branches is the payoff for the research you've already done. You build and maintain your tree in FamilySearch, Ancestry, or your genealogy software of choice; Bright Branches is where you see it, share it, and enjoy it.
No. Bright Branches displays your tree exactly as it exists in your source: FamilySearch, your GEDCOM file, or your Ancestry tree. All changes are made in your source, where your research lives.
If you can change the channel, you're qualified. There are no on-screen menus to learn — you explore the tree with the arrow buttons on the remote you already use.
Scan the QR code shown on your TV screen with your phone, then sign in with your Bright Branches account, FamilySearch, or Google. No typing passwords with a remote.
Where your tree comes from
Your Tree & Data Sources
Three ways. FamilySearch: connect your account and your tree appears. Nothing to upload. GEDCOM: export a GEDCOM file from your genealogy software and upload it on brightbranches.com. It carries your people, places, and citations, though no images travel inside the file. Ancestry: use our concierge import. We bring your tree over for you, photos and record images included.
The universal family tree file format. Every major genealogy program can export one, and Bright Branches can host it — so your tree appears on TV no matter where you built it.
Yes. Your FamilySearch tree is displayed live. When you make changes in FamilySearch, Bright Branches shows the current tree the next time you view it. Nothing to re-upload, nothing to sync.
Bright Branches is a FamilySearch Compatible Solution.
Some, and the limit comes from FamilySearch, not from us.
Memories come across. Photos uploaded to a person's Memories appear beside them, shown live from FamilySearch. A memory that is only written text, with no picture, stays on FamilySearch.
Record images do not. FamilySearch does not permit its record images to be displayed outside familysearch.org, and that applies to every connected app. The citations themselves still come across, so you can read what the record was and where it lives, and you open the image on FamilySearch itself.
An Ancestry concierge import is the exception. Every scan comes across and is hosted on our servers. Open the census page and zoom in. Wherever you attached a photo in Ancestry, it is on the person here too.
A GEDCOM carries the citations and none of the images. No photo travels inside a GEDCOM, from any program. The images are separate files on your computer, and a GEDCOM does not carry files.
Yes. Our concierge service imports your Ancestry tree — including photographs and sources — and keeps it refreshed with a monthly update. You don't re-enter anything.
You share your Ancestry tree with ancestry@brightbranches.com and grant editing rights. That's what allows us to retrieve your photos and record images along with the tree. We handle the import from there, typically within 24 hours. When you've made changes on Ancestry later, use the Refresh Tree button on your Trees page at brightbranches.com to request an updated import.
GEDCOM files up to 100MB are supported, which comfortably covers even very large trees.
Yes. Anything that exports a GEDCOM file works. MyHeritage, Family Tree Maker, Legacy, Gramps, and others all do.
Make your changes in your genealogy software, export a fresh GEDCOM, and upload it on brightbranches.com. Your TV shows the new version.
Yes. Your trees are managed on your Trees page at brightbranches.com, and you choose which one to view on your TV.
Because the designs are built to show a couple: one side of the tree is the husband's ancestry, the other side is the wife's. If your tree starts on you and no spouse is included, only your half has anyone to draw, and the other side stays empty.
The fix is to move the home person back a generation, to one of your parents. On your Trees page at brightbranches.com, open the tree's menu and choose Change home person. For GEDCOM and Ancestry concierge trees you search for the person and set them right there. For a live FamilySearch tree, the home person is your FamilySearch Starting Person. We walk you through changing it in your FamilySearch account settings, and your tree picks it up the next time it loads.
You can also re-center the tree on someone temporarily, without changing the home person: open their profile and press Center tree.
Five looks, one wall
Designs & Printing
Designs comfortably display six or more generations on screen at once, and you can navigate to any branch of a tree of any size.
Yes, any time. Every design draws the same family from the same records. GeoMeTree opens like a fan; Podscape squares it into pods; Bright Branches grows it as a tree; Square Roots lays it out as a bracket; Family Time arranges it around a clock face. Change the design and the tree redraws around the person you were already looking at.
Every design comes with preset color schemes, animated artwork scenes, or your own family photographs as the backdrop. Set it once and leave it on the wall.
Yes. On Apple TV, Android TV, Fire TV, and iPad, your family tree becomes a living screensaver.
Yes, printing is free on every plan, including free FamilySearch members. Generate and download the GeoMeTree as a PDF, PNG, or vector EPS from the web viewer at brightbranches.com and print it however you like. EPS scales to any size with no quality loss. Free members print with our preset palettes; Heirloom members can print in their own custom colors. No fulfillment, no shipping, no upcharge.
Seven layouts: the full double bow-tie in 5–7 generations (up to 36" × 24") and the single half-fan in 5–8 generations (up to 24" × 36"), all sized to standard frames. The print wizard shows a preview of every option.
What it costs
Plans & Pricing
There's a free tier when you sign in with FamilySearch, so you can see your own tree on your TV before paying anything. Paid plans unlock all five designs, animated artwork themes, and more — details at brightbranches.com/pricing.
Current plans and prices are always on the pricing page at brightbranches.com. If your tree is on FamilySearch, there's a free tier. Paid membership is the same price whichever way your tree comes in. The only extra is a one-time concierge fee for Ancestry imports, since we do that work for you.
All five tree designs, animated video backgrounds, custom color schemes, and your own family photos as backgrounds, across all your devices.
On brightbranches.com. Your TV never asks for payment. When you're ready, scan the QR code on screen or visit the pricing page and subscribe there. One account covers all your TVs and devices.
No. One membership covers unlimited TVs and devices. Sign in once on each device and you're set.
On the big screen
TV Apps & Devices
Live today: Apple TV, Android TV, Google TV, Fire TV, and iPad. Coming soon: Samsung and LG smart TVs. Go by the device you press play with, not the brand on the TV. If a streaming box or stick is plugged into your Samsung, LG, or Vizio, that's what runs Bright Branches, and it works today. The sample tree also runs in a desktop browser, right here on this site.
The Roku platform is built for streaming video channels. Bright Branches is an interactive app that the Roku hardware is unable to support. So Bright Branches isn't available on Roku. Don't let that stop you, though. Bright Branches runs on Apple TV, Fire TV, Google TV, and Android TV, and any of them will put your family tree on the big screen.
The iPad app is the full Bright Branches experience: the same five designs, profiles, and screensaver, moved by touch. It's also the perfect presentation device for a stand or shelf.
Almost always the streaming device rather than the TV. Bright Branches is designed for a 4K television and renders its interface in true 4K, but most streaming devices and smart TVs composite the app at 1080p and upscale it to fill the screen. Most 4K TVs upscale well, so the picture still looks clean, but fine text and thin lines sit softer than a native 4K feed.
For the sharpest result, use a device that renders the full interface in true 4K (Apple TV 4K is the one we recommend) on a 4K television. On a 1080p set the tree is perfectly legible, just not as crisp: the designs are drawn for the detail a 4K panel can show.
Bright Branches renders its interface in true 4K. But most Android TV and Google TV streaming devices and smart TVs composite the app interface at 1080p and upscale it to your screen, even on 4K panels. That's how the Android TV platform works on most chipsets, and it affects every app, not just Bright Branches. Video and photo playback can still be 4K, depending on the device. For the sharpest interface, Apple TV 4K and the Nvidia Shield render the full UI in true 4K.
Your TV's app store handles updates automatically in most cases. Just keep your device up to date.
Who sees what
Privacy & Who We Are
Our public sample trees show no living people's information. That's a firm rule. Living relatives' details never appear in any public demonstration of Bright Branches.
You, on your devices, signed in to your account. Your tree isn't public. If you've shared a GEDCOM tree with a family member, they can view it from their own account.
If you sign in with FamilySearch, your tree comes from them, and we don't store it. If you upload a GEDCOM or use the Ancestry concierge, we host it on our secure servers, protected under your account. Only you and the people you share with can see it, on the TV, the iPad, or in the web viewer at brightbranches.com. Everything travels encrypted over HTTPS.
Bright Branches LLC, a family-owned company in Lake Orion, Michigan — built by a family, for families.
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Send it over. And if you're ready to see your own family on the big screen, that starts with the tree you've already built.
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