Find a Grave

Edit Updates

As you probably know, we’ve been working for a while to update the Find a Grave edit system. We’ve just released an update to the site that brings the latest changes to all memorials on the site and updates pages where you process edits that have been suggested to memorials you manage.

A lot of the important work for these updates is behind the scenes to modernize the code, but it has allowed us to make some nice updates to the process now and will make it easier for us to improve the edit process in the future.

Some improvements you may notice with this change include:

• The ability to suggest edits for all fields, including Bios and Burial Details.

• The option to add a note explaining and providing support for the edits you are suggesting.

• A way to mark the memorial of a veteran.

• An option for members to mark (or suggest that a memorial page be marked) as a Cenotaph or Monument (formerly Memorial Site) without contacting support. To see these options, click “Additional grave marker options” just below Gravesite Details.

• A cancel option on the Suggest Edits page, so that if you change your mind or make a mistake, you can easily cancel a suggestion you have made there before the manager processes it.

• An edit in one field will no longer lock related fields. (Notice the name fields in the image above)

These updates will make it easier to suggest edits, but we know there will still be reasons to contact a manager, so we’ve added a “Contact manager” option that lets you send them a message.

We’ve also made important updates to the Suggested Edits page where you process edits suggested for memorial pages you manage. These changes support the new edit options, simplify the processing of edits and include:

• Options to accept or decline individual parts of a suggested edit.

• A comparison tool for reviewing edits suggested for long text fields like the bio and inscription.  This tool includes some different viewing options to help you evaluate the changes and color choices for people with different viewing abilities. You can also edit longer text suggestions in this tool before accepting it by clicking the “Modify” button.

• A quick view of the main grave photo to help you review suggestions. You’ll find the preview by clicking the thumbnail image on the left of the suggested edit.

• Improved search, grouping and sorting options for edits.

You can learn more about suggesting edits from these articles on our support site:

This has been a big project and we really appreciate the help of everyone who has given us feedback, helped with testing new ideas or pitched in in any way. We hope you’ll find these updates helpful. If you have feedback or suggestions, please leave a comment on this page.

880 comments

  1. I also have 39 suggested edits from April 28 & 29 that should have auto approved by now!!!!! that are still in the Pending queue.

  2. For suggested edits, there is a “select all” option when I use my computer, but that option does not appear when using my 2018 android phone. Instead, you have to individually select each edit. (I have flipped the phone horizontally, which then displays a little more information – i.e., the color coding key and the number of pages – but the select all option does not appear)

    • I have more than 90 edit suggestions over the past two days. Where is accept all? This method is tedious and time consuming and way too much unnecessary sections such as photos that have nothing to do with edits.

  3. I like the feature added where you can delete an edit on the memorial page. Makes it much easier. I also like the separation of father/mother/spouse memorial edits-sometimes I don’t have all the memorial numbers at the moment and this makes it easier to just add them individually. Thanks!

  4. The 21 day auto-approve window is not working for me anymore, either. Although many have commented on this, I don’t see any replies about it from the Find-A-Grave staff.

    • Thanks for your message. They new system has an additional check or two in place and then will auto process. We haven’t switched on the auto-process for those yet. They will process when we get that turned on.

      • Please turn this on as soon as possible. We go to a lot of trouble to submitted suggestions, so it would be nice if we could be rewarded as soon as possible. And it would be nice if memorials owned by “known auto approvers” could be approved sooner than 21 days. One such person owns hundreds of thousands of memorials.

      • You really need to clarify what this means. How much longer will the delay be for auto processing? There are many managers who NEVER approve edits; they just let everything sit.

        The edits in question were made BEFORE your new updates. They shouldn’t be affected bya dditional “checks.”

        When will auto-processing be re-activated?

      • I think you are over thinking this. FG have answered your query. Your edits are not lost and will be updated once they switch back on the auto edit process. There must be a reason why they haven’t done it yet and it’s probably because they need to iron out the bugs (and judging by all the comments there are quite a few). So just be patient and it will happen.

      • I’m curious about the status of the cemetery corrections edit that has been rolled out. If one accepts the edit and the burial details are changed, what’s to keep other people from making a memorial for the person in the cemetery (to whence the memorial was edited into) and then reporting the original memorial that was edited into the new location? Will it result in a message showing that a merge was ,”Approved with changes due to burial details showing significant changes?”

    • I sent an e-mail about it over the weekend, and I was told that they were forwarding that to the support team. I’m not sure why it’s being ignored here. This issue obviously came about from the updates. Everything was processing after 21 days prior to these changes.

  5. NOT Found in Bluff City, Arkansas!!!!
    Address Correction Needed Notification:
    The Sweet Home Cemetery 1021 Nevada 41, Prescott, Arkansas 71857

  6. When someone post a suggestion for an edit I would like their name listed as the contributor. I don’t like taking the blame for someone else’s wrong information and I think they should get the credit where credit is due.

    • As the manager, you should research the suggestions, and if there is not enough evidence to prove what they are requesting, then ask them for more information. Are usually decline them and ask the person to provide more information and to resubmit. This prevents the automatic approval at 21 days. Although I guess you can watch each suggestion, and as it gets closer to the 21 days, then delete it if they have been provided updated information.

  7. Please come up with a better icon for recognizing veterans. The current icon resembles an American military dog tag, but keep in mind that veterans from other nations may have different-shaped tags–for example, Britain’s tags are round, Canada’s consists of two break-apart rectangles, Australia’s can be hexagonal, Yugoslavia’s are rectangular. A simple banner with VETERAN might be a better icon that reflects no particular country.

    • Dog tags are already being misused. I have already gotten over 200 requests 44 from one person. They are also putting them on veterans wives graves who didn’t serve in the military and children’s grave it defeats the purpose. I think if you have military insignias on your graves headstone and buried in a National Cemetery no doubt you are a Veteran.

      • You can request any individual member to limit their Edit requests (say, 20 per week, etc.) It used to be that Findagrave’s rules told people to limit their Edits in this manner; but recently I noticed that was removed from the rules. When I asked on the Forums about it, I was told that we had to “work it out among ourselves.” If anyone badgers you with a huge amount of Edits, you can ask them to limit, and if they won’t, you can report it to Admins. Once someone realizes they have to keep track of the amount of Edits they send, they usually stop.

      • Yeah, I encountered that. Person threatened to report me for harassment.

        So I kept an Excel sheet and sent them exactly 10 at a time.

        Best part? They reviewed nothing. Everything sat for 21 days and then auto-approved.

        Folks like that just need to turn off their e-mail notifications and quit worrying about legitimate edits.

  8. Did I miss the part where the system will now email a manager to alert them there are suggested edits waiting for approval? I don’t check them every day and it should be optional per user preference, as many of those with hundreds of thousands of memorials managed likely check more often and would not like extra emails they don’t or find helpful.

  9. Really don’t like the newest changes. Takes three times as long to check the edits and approve them. Don’t use a computer anymore and do all this from my Android phone.

    Do like the veteran status addition.

  10. I like the new edits. It allows for more complete edits to the memorials.

    I would like to see the ability to search on the new editable fields. i.e., missing birthday, missing birth month, missing sex, missing maiden name for females, missing spouse, if there are children attached.

  11. Hi, love that we can now add the bio suggestions directly on the edit page
    However the note box does not allow sufficient caracters if we need to add support informations that explains the changes made and bio info.. I did contact the manager via email but that was an extra step

  12. A lot of thought obviously went into these changes, which overall greatly enhances and streamlines the editing process for memorial managers. I especially appreciate the cancel and the ability to accept/decline individual parts of an edit. Thank you.

  13. Great. Now I get multiple ‘edits’ a day that violate FaG guidelines (survivor info) and copyright law. Thanks for that. Like Wikipedia, now anyone can at least attempt to post anything they want, including false or incorrect information, to any grave record. NOT a good idea, FaGrave! By the way, who will protect the 30,000+ records I’ve created after I pass from being improperly, incorrectly and possibly illegally updated? Tremendous.

    • I agree with this completely. And I’m constantly getting bios that have errors in spelling, grammar and punctuation (ugh!). Also, when bios were submitted using “Suggest Other Corrections” I could copy and paste the bio and INCLUDE the submitter’s name and contributor number. Not just to give them credit, but if there was ever any question, it was easy to go back to that person and ask.

  14. Don’t like the edits to memorials layout, slow and difficult to process. The old format was easier to read and quicker to process, particularly if you had several memorial edits to deal with.
    Also a simple “veteran” would be more appropriate as this is supposed to be an International website, not all countries use or recognise dogtags as being military

  15. Hi, I look forward to the improvements. Thank you from a frequent submitter. And I have an improvement request, too.

    #1
    I desire feedback -an email- when or if the memorial page owner receives the edit request. Then I would know that the edit request made it to the owner.

    #2
    If it is not received -a dead account, for example, or they are not receiving messages, or there is no response for other reasons- I would like an email telling me so and what my options are.

    If my edits are never accepted, transparency for everyone is better than never hearing anything back.

  16. I am having an issue with the new system. I suggested an edit to change the mother on Memorial #103733159. I have just created the memorial for the woman I am suggesting as the mother (#254202235). When I go to edit her page, for some reason, I am seeing the edit I suggested for #103733159 there (i.e., suggesting a change to make her her own mother).

    • Hi Christopher, thanks for this example. This should no longer be occurring. We’ve looked at both of these memorials and the edit only appears where it should be appearing.

  17. I like what you have done Find A Grave but I think a new problem has arisen which is very annoying. I’m getting multiple emails as each edit field is approved . When I check it, I see there is still many edits still needing to be approved. It’s going to drive us insane getting 10 emails on one memorial if the owner doesn’t approve them all at once. Maybe hold and send confirmation of approvals once a day might eliminate piece meal approvals?

  18. I like all the changes. I like that individual fields are not locked due to pending suggestions on adjacent field. I no longer have to delete a pending suggestion because I uncovered one more piece of data to add in the next field. I love that the BIO is an editable suggestion box (but I have yet to find any of my BIO suggestions from the Suggested Edits page–perhaps I haven’t done any since the update). I hope it works similar to the Inscription field with a Compare button. The three different BIO, Notes, and Other fields are terrific improvements over the old Other Suggestions option. I no longer need to write multi-part Other Suggestions with one part that says “This is to you the manager and not intended for the BIO” and the other part suggesting something to add tor the BIO. However, I do wish I could see Other text that I sent to the manager the same way I can now see Notes on the Suggested Edits page.

    I have wanted to submit edits for Gravesite Details, Cemetery location/type, Cenotaph, and Veteran status for some time. I always had to send those as Other Suggestions to the manager or contact FG staff. That was pain. I love these additions.

    For the first time I notice that when I go to the Suggested Edits page the order of suggestions is how I like it– I’m not sure if you made the default ordering to be reverse-chronological Date Suggested or had it remember my preference from last time (cookies?). This is good. Before I had to change the order each time to get it by Date Suggested.

    The complaints on this blog/thread are legit, but this is a huge improvement. Yes it will be nice to see the auto accept working again. But I understand your reluctance to turn that on for BIO where an auto-accept could wipe out a lot of information. But auto accept should work on all the other fields as quickly as before and there may be solutions to the BIO problem (auto-accept what is being added, not subtracted). As a CS/IT professor who has taught web programming, I am impressed… and bravo for the way you added new elements without changing the entire interface and menu structure around. I hate when that happens.

    The suggestion to make the duration of auto-accept shorter based on the manager’s past behavior was intriguing. But rather than making it shorter for memorials by managers who are responsive at accepting suggestions, I would take it the other way. Compulsively unresponsive managers (auto accept is their default) could have their pages auto-accepted one day earlier for each 2000 pages that they manager over, say 5000 (down to as short as 1 week or 2). But that would require FG to have analytics that they can tap into for such an algorithm.

  19. I also wish you add to the site is when a Volunteer had log in last, its will show if they are still with us then

  20. Are biographies now mandatory? Many families opt to not include biographies or copies of obituaries; is that still allowed? The information within the biography section or no biography at all was up to the managers of memorials–has that changed or is that information still up to the manager of the memorial? If biographies are declined, then sent to Find a Grave for changes/additions to the biography won’t that create more work for the FG administrators?

    • Adding a biography to a memorial helps in memorializing the individual and shares more about their life. Managers review suggested edits and make decisions based on the research that is sent to them and their own research. If declining a suggested edit, a manager would include the reason for the decline and explain further so there is clear understanding. The member requesting the edit may send the biography again and include a note. We encourage members to work together and help one another.

      • That doesn’t answer the question-Are they mandatory? I’m sure there will be issues/disputes regarding biographies; what must be added, what doesn’t need included, etc. Ultimately, do managers still have the final say as to what is contained/or not contained in the biography of the memorials they manage? or is that now taken away when contributors disagree and Find A Grave decides what is added? If so, isn’t biography disputes additional work on Find A Grave administrators?
        Just asking for clarity, because disputes are going to happen 🙂

      • The manager manages the memorial and makes decisions about it. We suggest members work together and that managers consider adding both sets of information when there is differing information or disputes in the historical record. You can learn more here: https://support.findagrave.com/s/article/Suggest-Edits-Overview and Management Questions
        If a manager knows that a family member doesn’t want a biography on the memorial, then the manager would explain that in their decline reason.

  21. Not sure about this new system yet as checking edits is more difficult.
    An issue _ when multiple pages of approved suggested by me newest date displays old edits from page 2 onwards.

  22. The green accept button often no longer works. Frustrating.

    • We haven’t heard of this issue. Please share what browser/version you are using as well as the device you are using. We will do some testing to see if we can replicate it. Thanks for your help.

  23. I keep my edits by the id number. I wish there was an option to find how many different id numbers I have in my suggestions list. Also having this section done in light gray does not do well with older people. Black text is always best and the younger people think it’s cool but for us with eyesite problems find it really difficult to read.

    • Hi Priscilla, thanks for your feedback and suggestion. We’ll look into how we might show a total number for memorials. Have you tried the different color themes in Account Settings? They are listed under Site Preferences: https://www.findagrave.com/user/account That may not fix the gray text. We’ll look into it and see if there is anything else we can do to help.

  24. Accept buttons do not always work. Sometimes just clicking one will lock up the entire batch for while.

  25. Agree. What a mess! “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them” – Albert Einstein

  26. Many of us enjoy contributing to existing memorials. We are motivated by being able to monitor how many of our suggested edits are accepted each day or week by those who manage the memorials.

    It seems that feature has been deleted. Thank you for providing some type of explanation as to the reason.

    • Hi Dave, you should be able to see your accepted Suggested Edits under Suggestions I’ve Sent/Accepted. We are working on bringing the date range back, so this will be easier.

      • Thank you for bring back the date range, it is a very important tool
        Please also look into searching of accepted or declined edits when there are so many 100,000+
        still won’t complete the search, just dumps me out

  27. Someone has sent me an edit request to add ” M ” ( for male) to my fathers page/ bio. This seems kind of a petty request, what is the point ?

    • to you it may be petty? it takes nothing to accept it.. and move on. I think its petty that you brought it here. Remember your father has tons of relatives, most you more than likely don’t know.

      everyone finds a way to contribute, you don’t have to like it, but this is a collaboration group.. genealogy’s history has always been friendly and free sharing.. but these days people get testy about “their” person.. or “their” family..

  28. The changes are not mobile-friendly. Instead of having the current and edit side-by-side, you now have to search a long list for them. Too visually messy!

  29. YOU HAVE CREATED A NIGH MARE, I have more than 20,000 sites and now I am getting 20 or more edits each day to add gender, which you can tell by the name and military when it shows on their marker. I am spending time with these edits when I could be doing new research. JUST HATE the mess you have made.

    • Transfer the memorials to those who are willing to manage them.

  30. I like the new edit fields. Today was the first day I received an edit request with the new system. Being able to see what was suggested versus what I entered was a big help. I didn’t have to jump back and forth between the memorial.

    I like the notes area so that I can explain when I request a change.

  31. There seems to be a bug when there is an existing spouse attached to a memorial. When you edit the memorial and add the marriage date and save, the next time you edit that memorial (and the spouse’s memorial) it shows as an edit needing approval. However, you can neither approve or decline – as when you click the buttons, it’s to no effect. Please check and fix this! Email me if you need examples, thanks. I should note, there are no pending edits on the edit page when this happens!

    • Hi Carlina, we’re looking into this. Thanks for reporting it. What browser and device were you using when this occurred?

      • I was on a Mac computer using safari. Which is the browser/computer I’ve been using for months.

  32. Adjust wording– in “Transfer Management of …”
    You can use this form to transfer management of one of your memorials to another Find a Grave Contributor. This action is PERMANENT and can not be undone. If you are the original contributor your name will remain on the Memorial, but you will no longer be able to edit bio, dates, etc.

    Last line needs updated.. suggest “control” of bio, dates,etc.

  33. I took a look at my edits that had been declined today and noticed that if I made an edit for GPS location (removing, in my case) that the edit shown listed Plot location (with a change I hadn’t suggested) and not GPS location.

  34. A period in a sentence is followed by a space. English has always been that way and it looks incorrect when your programming removes that space.

    When I view a “suggested bio” I submitted, the space after the period is removed. It makes me think I made a mistake and need to cancel the suggestion. Only to make sure I have the spaces included, re-submit, and find that it wasn’t me who took out the spaces after the period.

  35. I would like the emails for accepted edits to include both 1st and last names. Just having the last names for links in the emails does not help me to double check the info accepted was the intended info.
    Otherwise (according to you) i have to get online, go to my edits, pull up the relevant record to confirm. That is a lot of work, just to make sure I got it right! when the info in the email would have been enough.

  36. I did not send any of the 4 edit requests for Margaret Thiele #171902067 that are shown in my list of pending requests I have sent.

      • This bug should be fixed. It may take a day for everything to settle given systems for the suggestion and processing of edits. Edits were being properly processed by the member that managed the memorial. The bug was a display/notification issue. If you see anything like this after today, please let us know by replying here.

      • Having the same issues here, even getting notifications via email saying edits I’ve not suggested have been accepted.

      • This bug should be fixed. It may take a day for everything to settle given systems for the suggestion and processing of edits. Edits were being properly processed by the member that managed the memorial. The bug was a display/notification issue. If you see anything like this after today, please let us know by replying here.

  37. Please consider a change to the recent edit update options, specifically, only permitting a gender or veteran status update to be submitted if it is also in conjunction with another significant edit to the same memorial. Contributors are now sending streams of gender-only and veteran flag-only edits to contributors. This has the potential to overwhelm contributors who manage thousands of memorials and turn the process from collaboration to a time-resource management project (less time to contribute new data in order to respond to updates).

    • I dont see how this simple change can overwhelm anybody. If you can’t or don’t want to handle them just leave them to auto edit in 21 days time. It really is a simple press of a button and it only needs to be done once.

  38. I am enjoying all the new updates…especially the one about the recognizing our Veterans. The only complaint I have, along with the most of my cemetery walker friends is not being able to leave a flower or picture on a new memorial, esp when I make a trip to the cemetery to take a photo of the grave with all the flowers. I had to start a virtual cemetery to log them, so I can go back later to add pictures and flowers.

  39. Please add a contact button for edit@findagrave It would be so nice to have one on the memorial, so if we have a question or problem it you go straight to you. When you share the memorial their is no place to add a comment either.

  40. Thanks for all the great modifications and fixing the bugs promptly!

  41. I entered a new mother for a memorial and now he has two mothers. They added the right one but kept the wrong one too. That would never have happened before.

    • Please send the edit once more and remove the incorrect mother. This should no longer be occurring. Thank you for writing in and please let us know if you see anything like this again.

  42. I’m showing zero pending updates, but when I go to the updates page there are a bunch of pending updates for memorials that don’t belong to me. I hope you fix this soon!

    • This bug should be fixed. It may take a day for everything to settle given systems for the suggestion and processing of edits. Edits were being properly processed by the member that managed the memorial. The bug was a display/notification issue. If you see anything like this after today, please let us know by replying here.

  43. If a bug reported here is fixed, could we have an announcement of that?
    (I’ve reported several bugs and don’t know that they have been fixed yet.)

    Will FindaGrave start displaying the gender on the memorial page (not just on the edit page?)
    And I don’t fear being overwhelmed by gender/veteran edits. If someone flooded me with thousands of edits, I’d just select on them and “accept selected”. Perhaps I’d scan the list to look at strange gender choices given the name, but I’m not going to research each edit suggestion.

  44. Although you have added a few helpful menu options, like the ability to add information to the bio section for consideration, I agree with others that this new menu seems more cumbersome. When each piece of information in an edit must be acted on, there are significant delays in being notified on edit approval or decline. The 21 day waiting time is exceeded on a number of my pending edits. With these changes it would be wise to open the memorial to see what edits are still outstanding. Also, pending edits are no longer in alphabetical order, it makes it time consuming to look back at your initial edit. Although the icon established for veterans is a nice idea, I will not go back into 15 years of work to do this. I usually note veteran status in the bio or with a flower offering I agree with one individual that said this revision was over thought, and the result ,unfortunately, maybe “throwing the baby out with the bath water”. Kudos for the time and effort that was put into this project. Thank You.
    NoraK

  45. All in all, a great job. Yes, there will be some bugs, but I love the new changes, especially to the bio section. I have so many biographies I have spent hours creating, only to have them ignored under the old system.

    I do all of my editing work on a laptop computer and the new format displays beautifully. Thanks FindaGrave, keep up the good work!

  46. Dear Find A Grave,
    The introduction of the new edits system seems to be causing quite a few complaints concerning the increased number of request to simply add M/F to the memorial. There are even some individuals that are being deliberately obstructive and declining these edits en-mass. Sighting the need for genealogical evidence in one case!
    I would like to suggest that this particulate edit to be auto accepted immediately so as to save any further issues and work for FG staff. Hopefully then all the complaints will stop.
    Thank you
    SteveN

  47. I don’t like the idea of edit requests being accepted after 21 days. I don’t check FaGrave daily. I was there today and had 3 pages of edits from one person 10 days ago! I never received an email that I had corrections waiting. I don’t have time right this minute to check all the things they requested.

    Reason for decline should be optional. I’m being requested to put periods after initials!

    Are people rewarded for the number of corrections they make? These rewards should be stopped. You can stop counting the number of memorials posted and managed as far as I am concerned. I would prefer accurate reporting, not quantity. And not bounty hunters.

    How do I report a bogus memorial for a person (surviving spouse on double headstone) who isn’t dead yet? There should be an option for that. I reported a duplicate memorial, one of which was a surviving spouse that was reported dead several years before actually dying … and the new, correct memorial with an obit was posted before the person was actually buried. Neither was correct but the one with the obit should have survived. It didn’t. How can one disagree with Admin’s decisions?

    Good question was raised above about what happens to our memorials when we die. Guess the answer is everything will be approved in 21 days automatically?

    A lot of good has come from your revisions but a lot of problems are popping up. It would be nice be able to easily contact FaGrave admin.

    • Our edit system has always processed edits that haven’t been processed after 21 days. The edit system is set up so you can easily review and accept edits. We ask members to be considerate when sending edits. If edits are a bit overwhelming, the manager and the member can come to an agreement on a specific amount.
      We remove memorials when requested by immediate family members or the individual. These requests can be sent to support@findagrave.com. We encourage members to ask another member or family member to help with the memorials after their passing. If a member has not set up a steward for the memorials before their passing, then Find a Grave and the Find a Grave community will manage the memorials at that time.
      We are running a bit behind on email right now at support@findagrave.com. The updates added, such as being able to edit and suggest edits for cenotaph/monument, biographies, and burial locations allows more community effort and gives managers the tools they need to update memorials.
      You can learn more about these subjects at our support site.

    • Periods after initials is in the Find a Grave guidelines.

      There is no “reward” for the number of edit suggestions a user makes. That count doesn’t show anywhere on their profile.

      The double markers (one living person and one deceased on the same marker)? Find a Grave allows that unless a family member of the living individual asks for it to be removed (I encountered this issue a month or so ago and got that answer from Find a Grave).

  48. I have a memorial with two fathers. I’ve never seen that before. Memorial #
    217528213 Marcella Catherine Schmidt Beavers. There is an update which looks like there two updates.

    Not sure how it got that way.

  49. Thanks for all the updates. Awesome job you guys have done. It’s come a long ways in the last 12 years.

  50. I’m able to put in ridiculously large years of birth/death, i.e. 5 digits. I don’t know if that was always the case, though.

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