Spending time in cemeteries and libraries may not be everyone’s idea of summer fun, but for those interested in finding their roots, gathering information about their ancestors. is a “family” vacation. Sure, genealogy sites have made researching ancestral history much easier with digitized document archives, family tree-building software, and community forums. But not all It is online.
As you visit libraries, archives, and cemeteries in search of your roots, keep your smartphone or tablet handy—it can help you with translation tools, document scanners, and more. Here are some tips that can make your research trips more efficient.
Decipher text
Old newspapers, religious records, tombstones, and official government documents (whether preserved in an analog archive or digitized online) can be invaluable resources for information about your ancestors. However, not all sources may be in a language you know.
Google Lens (available as an Android app or within the Google app for iOS) can isolate words from an image and provide an on-screen translation. You can also copy the isolated text into a note or document.
In iOS 15 and later, you can use Apple’s Live Text feature, which uses the camera to translate, copy, and share text visible on the screen. When you have a document or tombstone in view, tap the square Live Text icon in the bottom left corner. The software highlights the words and offers a Translate option in the pop-up menu.
If you still can’t find the words, consider free translation apps on your phone. Google Translate (for Android and iOS and the desktop web browser) and Apple’s Translate app for its iOS devices are options, as are third-party translation apps and AI chatbots.
If the software is having trouble recognizing text or if you have handwritten records that produce confusing translations, try retyping the content in your phone’s Notes app or a word processing document. Then, paste that text into your translation app to see the results. Software-generated translations may not be perfect, but you can probably get a general idea.
Poor quality images, input errors, or languages that use certain alphabets or stylized fonts can confuse the software, so look for help on the web to convert words into something your translation app recognizes. For example, some newspapers produced for German immigrants used typefaces such as Fraktur with certain characters that do not exist in other alphabets, but you can find tables to identify them.
Scan documents
When you discover documents in libraries and archives that have not been digitized, use your phone to scan the pages you need (with the institution’s approval, of course). If you don’t have a dedicated scanner app, use the tool in Google Drive or Apple’s Notes app.
Using Apple’s Notes app, create a new note and tap the camera icon. You have menu options to scan the document itself or scan the text directly into your note.
Digitize photos
Taking pictures of images from old yearbooks and other photo collections is a quick way to get your own digital copies. Your phone’s photo editing tools can quickly crop and enhance files. You can also transfer and clean up the images later on your computer with photo editing tools on a larger screen.
Alternatively, Google has a free PhotoScan app for Android and iOS that attempts to correct glare, warping, perspective, warping, and faded colors in old prints when you photograph them. When you open PhotoScan and point your phone at an image you want to digitize, the app guides you through capturing the image from various angles. It then attempts to reconstruct a better version by combining separate shots and automatically enhancing color, contrast, and other image elements.
find graves
Visiting an ancestor’s final resting place allows you to pay your respects and sometimes gain new details from a burial marker. Online resources like Find a Grave and BillionGraves can point you to plots (virtually or in person) and often provide photographs of headstones; BillionGraves has a free basic tier and subscriptions starting at $5 a month for more features like GPS coordinates for every recorded burial site.
