23andMe Health + Ancestry Service: Personal Genetic DNA Test Including Health Predispositions, Carrier Status, Wellness, and Trait Reports (Before you buy see Important Test Info below)

I spent a bit of time researching the various options for DNA testing before deciding that 23andMe would likely be the most detailed. The results took just under 7 weeks to arrive. What happens, for UK customers at least, is you send your saliva sample to a facility in Milton Keynes (using the prepaid return box) they then hung onto it for a few weeks in my case, presumably so they can package up and send a bunch of them in one go to the main lab which is in Los Angeles. A FedEx tracking link appeared in the Android app after week 4, which allowed me to track the sample to LA (up until this point, I was a little worried it had been lost in the post). About 7-8 days later, I received the notification that my sample had arrived at the lab. It took a further maybe 10 days to process and review, then the results appeared in the app.The data provided is *extremely* detailed. My DNA was actually traced back to being predominantly from the correct ancestral hometown (the town I was born in). The "DNA Relatives" section had filled in a family tree, correctly, with some cousins who'd also apparently done 23andMe tests in the past. I discovered I'm just under 2% Neanderthal (explains a lot...) and the detail on some of the traits is incredible (e.g. "you have two variants associated with having a worse sense of direction". and "you have one variant associated with being less likely to have a fear of heights").The health info also correctly identified the fact I'm at increased risk of Age-Related Macular Degeneration (both my mother and grandmother suffered from this) and various other details I won't bore you with. It's also reassuring that it correctly identifies hair colour, eye colour, skin tone, etc.I was a little bit dubious about this entire process before getting the results, and wasn't sure how much I'd learn but I have to say I'm extremely pleasantly surprised by the quantity and the quality of the data provided. You can even download the raw data for your entire genetic profile from the website (about 5.6MB) and perform your own search against particular genetic markers that may not have been covered by the standard reports they provide.I'd highly recommend this to anyone.

Bought for a secret Santa gift for a family member, they sent it off and got their results in about 3 weeks. They're very happy with their results, and some of the facts/predicted health conditions or traits are accurate. This is good for people who may have no previous idea on ancestry, or for people who want to find out what health conditions they're most likely to get and look after their bodies to prevent it.

Got my results quicker than expected very pleased

This is the best of the gene test companies you can do. It gives the most information and I trust the results of this more than others.However, you can download the Raw data from any of these companies and submit to other websites for free and get an absolutely ginormous amount of health data.The other thing to remember is that some companies use swabs and some you have to spit. If you use 23andme you have to spit, which may be more difficult for small children.I've had my results and my families results for several years and the ethnicities that it's shown has changed dramatically each time they've done updates. This is to the point it's a bit embarrassing telling people about the changes because it makes the whole thing look a little untrustworthy. I also compared my results to another major gene testing brand and it came up with significant ethnicities that 23andme said I had 0% of. We are obviously in the early stages of all this stuff and whatever results you get should be with a huge pinch of salt.Another thing to remember is that it only goes back a few generations. If you think that you are descended from Vikings that raided the British isles it won't be able to pick up any of that because all those Viking genes will be seen as British genes and just show up as British.23andme also doesn't differentiate between the countries of Great Britain, wearas other companies do.Some of the stuff 23andme states is a complete joke. The neanderthal ancestry is close to being completely made up, neanderthal DNA has supposedly been sequenced, but even if you believe that to be true, how many neanderthal genomes can you believe they have sequenced? To take at most a few genomes from a group and then use that as the basis for all the genomes of that group seems a bit scetchy. If they took 5 genomes from homo sapiens that wouldn't be considered a sufficient range of genomes to represent the whole population. Who knows if Neanderthals were actually just homosapiens that looked a bit different anyway. You could easily think a corgi and husky were different species if you didn't know better.23andme is playing a bit of pseudoscience. When they try and do their graphs for Y chromosome spreading and over what time frame it's all too theoretical and based on biased assumptions. I've done a lot of reading about this sort of stuff and 23andme seem to have been a bit lazy mixed with too keen to try and present data for something that isn't fully known about and could easily be completely and utterly untrue. This is annoying because they write everything as matter of fact, proven and fully accepted knowledge. The danger with this is that people will read it and think it's scientific fact and put it on Wikipedia, force others to accept it etc.Anyway this turned from being a review to a bit of a rant so I'll stop now

Took just over a month for results