GEDCOM is the plain-text file format genealogy programs use to pass a family tree from one program to another. We checked 14 everyday family situations against the text of its specification, versions 5.5.1 and 7.0. Version 7.0 has a defined structure for 12 of them, including a same-sex couple and a child with both birth and adoptive parents. Version 5.5.1 has one for 10. Neither defines the Chinese lunisolar calendar, so a 農曆 (nónglì) birthday goes in as a converted Gregorian date, with the lunar wording kept beside it as a date phrase.
Version 7.0 points HUSB and WIFE at partners of any gender
GEDCOM "was developed by the Family History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints", says the FamilySearch GEDCOM 7.0 specification, revision 7.0.18 of 17 February 2026. Version 7.0 "was released in 2021 as the latest version of the GEDCOM format".
A family record, FAM, points at two partners through HUSB and WIFE tags. Page 25 of the 5.5.1 specification says the structure "assumes that the HUSB/father is male and WIFE/mother is female." Version 7.0 lets a FAM describe a family "regardless of the gender of the partners". Its SEX tag adds X to M, F and U, for anatomy at birth that "does not fit the typical definition of only Male or only Female"; gender identity is "not currently given" a tag. So 7.0 can mark an intersex person.
Remarriage and adoption each link through another family record
Both versions use one FAM per union. In 5.5.1's words, a man in "more than one family union … would appear in more than one FAM_RECORD." A child with adoptive and birth parents carries two child-to-family links, each typed as adopted, birth, foster or sealing. On our reading, a step-child links only to the family of the parent it was born to.
| Situation | 5.5.1 | 7.0 |
|---|---|---|
| Two parents and their children | Y | Y |
| Same-sex couple | P | Y |
| Remarriage after divorce or death | Y | Y |
| More than two partners at once | Y | Y |
| Adoptive link marked apart from a birth link | Y | Y |
| Birth and adoptive parents both kept | Y | Y |
| Child of one partner only | Y | Y |
| Sex unknown, or intersex | P | Y |
| Same ancestor in two lines | Y | Y |
| Chinese name with its romanisation | Y | Y |
| Lunar date as its own calendar | N | N |
| Living-person privacy flag | P | P |
| Death recorded | Y | Y |
| Birth order without dates | Y | Y |
Y: the specification names a structure for the case. P: it has one but assumes against the case, covers part of it, or calls its own definition ambiguous. N: none. The verdicts are ours, from the text; no file went through a validator or a genealogy program.
Cousin marriage leads both lines back to the same ancestor
GEDCOM records refer to each other by pointer, so one person can be a parent in two lines. When second cousins marry, their children reach the same great-great-grandparents by two routes, and the file holds those ancestors once. That is pedigree collapse, the subject of our guide to how many ancestors you had a thousand years ago; cousin degrees are counted in our guide to cousin degrees and marriage law.
A TRAN line connects 孔德庸 to its pinyin
The 7.0 specification's own example of a transliterated name is Chinese: 1 NAME /孔/德庸, then 2 TRAN /Kǒng/ Déyōng with 3 LANG zh-pinyin. FamilySearch's migration notes say 5.5.1's ROMN and FONE "were replaced by the more versatile TRAN". No name piece holds a generation character (字辈, zìbèi), though a FACT with a TYPE can; see our guide to Chinese generation names.
Lunar birthdays go in as a Gregorian date that keeps the lunar wording
Version 7.0 "defines 4 calendars: GREGORIAN, JULIAN, FRENCH_R, and HEBREW", and 5.5.1's list has no Chinese calendar either. In 5.5.1, INT marks a date interpreted from a date phrase that follows in brackets. In 7.0, a DATE can carry a PHRASE line. To record a birthday from the fifth day of the eighth lunar month, you would enter that day's Gregorian date and keep the lunar wording as the accompanying phrase.
Typing order can point 伯伯 at the wrong uncle when birth years are blank
Chinese calls a father's older brother 伯伯 (bóbo) and his younger brother 叔叔 (shūshu). Without birth years, a tree tool can read age from typing order. GEDCOM keeps order as data: CHIL pointers "should be chronological by birth", and a void pointer marks "a placeholder for an unknown child".
Until 3 November 2026 our family tree builder read age from typing order. In our 20-person test tree, clearing every birth year changed 32 of 380 Chinese relationship labels. Its English labels were false for at least 70 of those 380 pairs, among them every husband and wife, who read "the same person (by marriage)". The same test on every label found 116.
The revision of 3 November 2026 decides age only from two different birth years. To re-run it, give a grandfather two sons, Alan then Ben, with no birth years, and give Alan a daughter, Mei. Choose Chinese, click Mei, then Ben: the panel reads 伯伯 / 大伯 或 叔叔 and says the order is unknown. The tool still allows one spouse per person and exports its own JSON rather than GEDCOM.
PDPC's holiday example leaves the husband outside the data duties and the agency inside
Singapore's Personal Data Protection Act, s.4(4), as at 3 November 2026 on Singapore Statutes Online, "does not apply in respect of" personal data "contained in a record that has been in existence for at least 100 years", or personal data "about a deceased individual". Its provisions on disclosing and protecting personal data still apply, though, to someone "who has been dead for 10 years or less". The section does not say whether a newly compiled tree is such a record. (Text of s.4(4) is subject to copyright of the Singapore Government and is reproduced with the permission of AGC.)
Section 4(1)(a) says Parts 3 to 6B of the Act "do not impose any obligation on" an individual "acting in a personal or domestic capacity", as quoted in our guide to what PDPA does not cover. The PDPC's Advisory Guidelines on Key Concepts in the PDPA, revised 29 April 2026, describe the duties that outlast a death as organisations' obligations. In their example Tom gives a travel agency his wife Jane's details to book a family holiday. Tom is not subject to the Data Protection Provisions; the agency "must comply with all the Data Protection Provisions" for both, unless an exception applies. The example does not mention genealogy sites, and the guidelines are advisory.
The privacy flag points both ways by the spec's own account
The restriction notice, RESN, can be set to CONFIDENTIAL, LOCKED, or PRIVACY. Version 7.0 ties the PRIVACY flag to data shared only within a trusted circle, "generally because it contains information about living individuals". It then says that this definition "is known to admit multiple interpretations, so use of the PRIVACY restriction notice is not recommended." In 5.5.1, the notice was "defined for Ancestral File usage", where a download could flag privacy for people "assumed living" (born in the last 110 years with no death date).
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