MyHeritage Introduces a Low-Pass Whole Genome Autosomal DNA Test & Why It Matters

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Another first for MyHeritage!

MyHeritage, Ultima Genomics, and Gene by Gene, the parent company of FamilyTreeDNA, have jointly announced that MyHeritage is introducing a Whole Genome Sequence (WGS) test using equipment produced by Ultima Genomics. MyHeritage DNA tests will continue to be run in the Gene by Gene Genomics Testing Center in Houston, Texas.

MyHeritage expects to process more than one million DNA tests annually, which is GREAT for genetic genealogy.

You may have heard about whole genome sequence tests before and wonder why this is a big deal. There are several reasons!

All Whole Genome Tests Are Not the Same

Not all whole genome sequence tests, abbreviated WGS, are the same, and MyHeritage has overcome substantial hurdles.

The human genome consists of roughly 3.2 billion base pairs, and most of the human genome is the same between all humans. Traditional autosomal tests target roughly 700,000 of the locations known to be least similar.

Whole genome tests don’t target specific locations, but scan the entire genome, using an entirely different technology. Think of an airplane or a drone flying over your genome.

In whole genome sequencing, we refer to “passes” and “depth”, meaning how many times the genome is scanned (passes), and how many times each location is successfully read (depth). The higher the number of passes, which increases the depth, the higher the cost, not just of the scan but of combining and aligning the data into usable information.

The reason WGS uses multiple passes is because even the most reliable technology is going to miss some things. It’s the nature of the beast.

Even with a 99.99% accuracy rate, which isn’t achieved, more than 320,000 locations would either be missed entirely or reported with erroneous values.

Scanning once would be called a 1xWGS, or one-pass whole-genome sequence.

Clinical or medical-grade whole-genome tests are 30x or greater. That’s important, because diagnoses are based on the results. Those tests are typically ordered by your physician, but you can order them individually from specialized providers.

To make WGS testing even remotely affordable for consumers, enough information needs to be extracted from the lowest number of passes possible.

For several years, direct-to-consumer (DTC) whole genome tests have been available from a number of third-party companies, but none came with Y-DNA, mitochondrial DNA, nor autosomal files, nor with matching. For genealogy, a file without matching capability is useless. In other words, if you really wanted a whole genome sequence, you could purchase it, but it was piecemeal and “some assembly was required.”

One of the challenges has been that for a quality read, the resulting file size generated was prohibitive for storage. I have taken a WGS test, and the results were literally shipped to the customer, for an additional charge, on a hard drive.

The other challenge was cost. Some vendors charge for just the sequencing, but you purchase results from a secondary menu.

Needless to say, none of this is useful or practical for genealogy.

This is exactly why the MyHeritage introduction is important. Through a unique combination of innovation and partnerships, MyHeritage found a way to reach the critical tipping point that makes WGS technology both affordable and available for all genealogists.

While MyHeritage does not provide Y-DNA or mitochondrial DNA testing, they provide world-class autosomal testing with matching, ethnicity results, Theories of Family Relativity, triangulation, and much more.

Moving to a WGS platform opens the door for future innovation beyond what we know today.

My Hope

My fervent hope is for increased granularity, meaning that matching might eventually reach further back in time, and ethnicity can be improved and become more specific. MyHeritage did not say that – it’s me hoping out loud.

Of course, both of those features would rely on enough people testing on the new platform so that areas not currently harvested by traditional technology become available for analysis.

What’s out there, waiting? I don’t know, and neither does MyHeritage. But someone has to be the first pioneer, and MyHeritage, never afraid of a challenge, has stepped up and stepped out.

What About Compatibility?

MyHeritage did not make this move quickly or take it lightly. You can read their 2020 study describing matching using 1x low-pass sequencing, here.

All vendors, over time, change the underlying chips and technology. They have no choice, because their vendors upgrade and make changes too. That’s also why some vendors are more, or less, compatible with other vendors. In some cases, the resulting DNA file incompatibility is too great, meaning too few of the same locations are tested, and vendors who accept uploads don’t accept some versions from other vendors.

MyHeritage would never adopt a platform that was incompatible with their existing customers’ tests, so the new WGS test is backward compatible.

Imputation is a technology that has been used for years in the genetic genealogy industry, to “equalize” files that don’t test exactly the same locations, and although they don’t say, I’m sure some type of imputation will be used here as well.

My Experiment

Let me tell you what I’m going to do.

I’m going to order a new MyHeritage DNA test so that it will be processed on the new equipment.

After the results are uploaded, I will compare matching and the other MyHeritage DNA features between my current and the new WGS test. How does that sound?

Customers can toggle back and forth between different tests at MyHeritage, so you can do this too.

Will Other Vendors Follow Suit?

Not all vendors are as transparent as MyHeritage about their technology, so there’s really no way to know about specific vendors unless they publish their information.

I do know that low-pass WGS would not be conducive to some types of tests. For example, Y-DNA testing that relies on either targeted location reads or multiple reads of every location to produce precise haplogroup calls would not scale well, and neither would mitochondrial DNA. Some Y-DNA locations are read as many as 35 times.

Each vendor has to make their own decision based on their own products, criteria, and customer needs.

Uploads From Other Vendors

You might have noticed a few weeks ago that MyHeritage stopped accepting uploads from other vendors. This might be a hint as to why that decision was made.

You’re always better off taking the test of the vendor where you want to work with matches. The vendor’s own test will always be more accurate when using their products and matching.

Downloading Your New File From MyHeritage

In their press release, MyHeritage committed to providing a file download in a CRAM file format. A CRAM file stores only the differences between a sequence and its reference genome, which means it’s substantially smaller than an entire whole genome. How large is it? I have no idea, but we will see.

Uploading to Other Vendors

Will you be able to upload your file to other vendor sites? I don’t know the broader answer to that question but neither Ancestry nor 23andMe accept any uploads.

FamilyTreeDNA says they are preparing to accept the new MyHeritage file uploads by year-end.

Ordering New Tests

Some MyHeritage tests are already being run on the new WGS machines, but beginning today, all MyHeritage tests will be WGS tests. (Update – MyHeritage has clarified that only kits arriving in the lab in January 2026 are guaranteed to run on the WGS machine. So if you order now at the sale price, wait to mail it back until January.)

Existing tests purchased in the past will not be rerun. Unless the customer has paid for the MyHeritage biobanking service, MyHeritage does not store your DNA after processing, so they can’t reprocess your DNA.

MyHeritage DNA tests, typically $89, are on sale for $36 right now, so there has literally never been a better time to purchase a MyHeritage DNA test. Click here to purchase.

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50 thoughts on “MyHeritage Introduces a Low-Pass Whole Genome Autosomal DNA Test & Why It Matters”

  2. Because my ethnicity is Ashkenazi Jewish, is there any point in purchasing a new DNA test from My Heritage? I had uploaded my Family Tree DNA results to My Heritage several years ago. (I have some Sephardic Jewish heritage as well.)

    I found my ancient origins results from My Heritage fascinating and insightful.

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  3. Will the new MH test make it easier to find a brick wall? I have a 3x great grandfather who came out of nowhere, left by fairies under the bushes! He has foiled Brickwall genealogists; he has BigYtest, along with his nephew, in a FTDNA project—they only match each other. Would this additional test help?

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  4. Greetings,

    I ordered the test from your article, before seeing the above message, so maybe I will just have them do a re-run of it when you let us know results are closer to their “goal post !”

    I love your Website’

    anniedear, w. c

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  5. Thanks for the clarification that all tests run after Jan will be WGS. I recently bought and received the results of a native MH test after uploading my Ancestry and 23andMe results years ago, but at $36, I jumped on the bandwagon (through your link) to be one of the early WGS testers with them.

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  6. this is very interesting. so MH is not going to sell two tests. And if you purchased a kit in the past and it was not used, if it is used next year it will be processed for WGS. Although this is only 1x, this is really a bargain price.

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    • Yes. Until year end it might be processed on either platform. After year end, it will be WGS. The collection kit is the same.

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  7. did we have the option to save or archive our DNA at MH when we tested ? If we did that can MH use that for this new WGS test. Might be helpful if we have family who tested but are not able to test now. That would be very good. Has MH mentioned if this is possible ?

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    • There was an option to purchase their archive service in 2023. If you have archived DNA, I don’t know the procedure to use it. You’ll need to contact them.

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  8. I did a WGS test in the past. It was 30x. I wonder if MH will accept uploads for those tests. There were several types of files and the results were mailed.

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    • Thanks for this update. Because my ethnicity is Ashkenazi Jewish (all over Europe according to MH), is there any value in my ordering this special update?

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  11. I have a small supernumerary chromosome, familial, no mosaicism. Genetics report says at the top 47 XY Abnormal Female. This was 25 years ago and no one seemed to know much about it. Do you think I could learn more from this test?

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    • I doubt it. This isn’t designed for that at all, and they are not testing either the Y and they may well ignore the X altogether.

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  12. Thanks for this update, Roberta. I had already gotten an email from MH about this, and ordered my kit yesterday. The more, the merrier for the new WGS testing!

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  13. So, like 23andMe, we will get information about our X chromosome(s)? I have interesting, unexpected matches involving one of my X chromsomes. That would be interesting to see… eventually.

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  14. When I click on the link for the My Heritage DNA test it comes up as $56.00 not $36.00 as mentioned in your post.

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    • Mine says ‘expired in one hour’ so I bet you’re in a different time zone. The sale has apparently expired.

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  15. Are the FTDNA and MH tests done in the same lab in Houston? If so, I wonder if it would be possible to transfer a sample stored by FTDNA to MH for a WGS test. The tester lives on the other side of the world, in a country where customs often prevent biological samples from being shipped, so returning another kit to MH would not be easy.

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  16. What I gleaned from that 2020 paper you kindly referenced is that the 1X test described worked adequately for samples of 200 cM and above and that should, they said, suit most people.(!?) That represents my top 0.02%.
    Where I need help is 15 to 35 cM (around 35% of my MyHeritage matches).
    Keen to see how that works out. Thank you for bravely pioneering this test.

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  17. Will the new MyHeritage CRAM file not include Y-DNA SNPs? In other words, if we transfer the autosomal data to FTDNA, will we not be able to get a haplogroup result?

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  18. Hi Roberta,
    I have a premium subscription to MH here in NZ.. and the link you provide DOESgo to a special offer at a good price, but it does NOT say anything about WGS, and i have seen nothing from MH about that option. So, I checked with them, and their chatbot says (in part) …
    “… the statements in those newsletters are inaccurate regarding our current testing technology. We are still using Illumina’s Global Screening Array (GSA) technology for our DNA tests, not whole genome sequencing (WGS). .. While we are exploring WGS as a future technology …. it’s not currently available as part of our regular DNA testing service. The discounted tests available in New Zealand are our standard autosomal DNA tests using the GSA chip technology”
    So, their chatbot may need updating. And maybe it will respond differently to a US based customer. But I wonder if you could please clarify when and where these tests will be available, because, as it stands, anyone clicking the link in your newsletter from here (and maybe elsewhere .. maybe outside the US?) will just get another (probably redundant) standard test kit

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  19. Uh oh. We just got the kits and they are now completed and ready to be mailed. Do you think it be OK to wait until January?

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    • They have updated their information to say it can’t be guaranteed until in January. If you want whole genome, wait to return your test until then.

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  22. Thanks for this information. I was concerned about low DNA coverage not being that accurate since other WGS, in the past, required 10X or higher coverage for accurate detection of single nucleotide variants (SNV). However, in a recent Aug 2025 preprint from Ultima Genomics (read their paper here: doi.org/10.1101/2025.08.11.669689) they revealed the details of their technology. Their procedure employs a duplex sequencing design, where both the plus and minus strands of each single DNA fragment is amplified at the same time prior to sequencing. Thus, they can confirm that any SNV is present at that position if it is found on both the plus and minus strands and discard sequencing errors when a change is only found on one of the complementary strands. They reported a low SNV detection error rates of 7.8 e-8 for genomic DNA and that the desired duplex sequencing was achieved on ~45% of the genome using 100 ng of DNA. This allows for 10-100-fold less sequencing than competing error-correction strategies to effect equivalent coverage. MyHeritage recently said that they will be doing 2X coverage. So, using the procedures as published will achieve highly reliable data even at low coverage hence the reason for the lower cost. It will indeed be interesting to compare chip array data to WGS results.

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    • I think we are likely to be disappointed. The newer paper refers to ppmSeq as a new preparation “adapter” for the same Ultima UG100 equipment that MyHeritage is using. The paper specifically says it is not the standard adapter.
      The 2020 preprint from MyHeritage refers to needing lots of imputation, so my guess is that the standard process is a single strand read.

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      • The 2020 Preprint was a proof of concept using a different whole genome sequencing technology (DNBseq technology) and was analyzed at 1X low coverage sequencing. (see doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.09.289322). As stated in this paper ”1x sequencing coverage necessarily entails that about half of the genotypes reflect only one out of the two possible alleles in the autosomal regions.” Thus, they needed imputation to infer the missing allele in this study. MyHeritage already said that they are doing 2X coverage not 1X.

        In the 2025 preprint from Ultima Genomics, it says that” to quantify the ratio of Watson copies and Crick copies on the sequencing bead, a critical innovation involves custom adapter sequences containing a known mismatch sequence (here, a 6-bp sequence of adenines on both strands of the adapter).” Regarding these not being the ‘standard adapters’, the preprint states “ppmSeq adapters were designed for compatibility with the UG100 sequencer. The standard UG adapter sequences were extended by ppmSeq-specific sequences to include the AAAAAA bubble in both the start and the end of the single-end reads”. When they say standard adapter, this seems to be refer to the older version of the adapter which this new innovative adapter is being compared to and now replaces. Without these adapters it’s not a ppmSeq analysis. Since this is a major advantage in terms of having error-corrected WGS and lower costs, I don’t see why they wouldn’t use these adapters? [I don’t think the cost of this adapter would differ significantly from standard adapters as there aren’t any exotic nucleotides used.] I assume we’ll know once those testing look at their CRAM files.
        Perhaps Roberta, can clarify that MyHeritage is utilizing the ppmSeq technology on their Ultima Genome sequencers as described in the preprint.

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    • They haven’t mentioned anything. It’s not something I expect because their goal was to price this very competitively to encourage lots of people to test.

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  24. I’m curious as to know how much interest there is in this new test. Ever since MyHeritage made the announcement, I’ve kept tabs on their website. It seems like they’ve repeatedly put the test on sale for three days, sometimes extending the sale a couple more days, or just going into a new three-day sale cycle. They also have continuously offered the option to include a 30-day trial of the MyHeritage Complete plan, all for $25, including free shipping. I haven’t paid attention to their sales in the past, so maybe this is their standard approach, particularly this time of year. If sales are slow, they may be contending with the residual of DNA testing fatigue which started about 5 or 6 years ago. Or maybe potential testers are holding off to see what results the new test yields (i.e. to paraphrase the old state of Missouri nickname, “show me”).

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  25. Forgive me if these topics have been thoroughly addressed, but 1) just attended a My Heritage meet up and it was announced that as of earlier in the month, all new kits returned are receiving WGS. 2) I added the kit to my current MyH account and hoping my old kit’s data won’t be overwritten, is there any assurance that won’t happen? I have another family member kit on my account and I know how that works, so I start seeing myself as a match? Thank you for all you do for our sector!

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