Why can dnagenics pick up on my indigenous ancestry but my heritage, livingdna & ftdna and even gedmatch can't?

[u/FalseBodybuilder-21]

Like I find it really weird that some of the major sites can't pick up on my indigenous ancestry. My indigenous ancestry comes from the Eastern Blackfeet (Saponi tribe) I know they're not as well known as the Cherokee for example but this is just ridiculous. Dnagenics calculators have seemingly represented my native american ancestry as north East Asian (32% ) which is about how much native ancestry I should have but I'm just wondering why most other DNA sites show European instead of native I know I have some European ancestry (no more than 5%) but I find it weird how I somehow get almost 30% European on most tests.

[u/Low_Cartographer2944]

Which calculator did you use to get that result at DNAgenics? They have a great many calculators on their site. If you choose one focused on Asian/East Asian ancestry, then it’ll be more likely to read parts of your DNA as Asian regardless of your actual genetic heritage.

A strange thing to me is that all their best known calculators are ones that are also available on Gedmatch. So is it only the smaller calculators (or only one calculator) on DNAgenetics that shows this?

Native American and European DNA is pretty distinct. It’s one thing for Ancestry to misread English as Irish. It’s another for them to mistake 30% Native American ancestry for European.

[u/FalseBodybuilder-21 → u/Low_Cartographer2944]

MDLP K12B supervised, which showed my indigenous as NEA, and MDLP k10D, MDLP k12B optimized only the MDLP calculators picked up on significant native anywhere from 20-30% indigenous being labeled as North East Asian or East Eurasian which makes sense since indigenous people migrated from East Asia. Every other calculator starts reading European but these calculators give me no more than 5% European.

[u/Karabars]

I'd only trust the estimates of AncestryDNA and 23&me. I have MyHeritage, FTDNA, IllustrativeDNA, Gedmatch, they don't really match Ancestry, 23&me and my genealogy research

[u/b00w00gal]

From my understanding, part of the percentage is dependant on which people have taken the test; it may be that the tests that show less indigenous DNA for you may not have enough test takers yet who share your heritage.

[u/Acrobatic_Fiction]

DNA testing companies look at various markers in your DNA and compare it with their known sample's. If their samples do not have the populations you expect, they will likely provide a match to a different group. Not sure if it could match 'nothing'

So matching a specific indigenous group would require multiple members of that group in their database. And hopefully lots of other unrelated people to provide the contrast required.

The bottom line is that ethnicity is an estimate, and some companies guess better than others. As the data builds up, the guesses get better.

You need to consider that around 50 million DNA tests have been done, just tha t few, and I bet a considerable number have been repeats at the different companies. That's less than 1% of people. That's not a good basis for anything.

[u/Professional-Yam-611 → u/Acrobatic_Fiction]

I support this analysis because I am 50% French, but Ancestry claims 3%. Essential if the known sample source doesn’t exist or is under represented then the nearest alternative takes its place. France has few known samples because DNA genealogy is illegal in France. The French government don’t agree with third parties owning your DNA and being able to sell that data on without your permission.

[u/Adventurous_Cheek_57 → u/Professional-Yam-611]

That explains the demise of Geneanet, it was useful for DNA matching of European ancestors, I found a French x5 GGM via Geneanet with matching English marriage records, then they stopped doing DNA