How to look up your ancestry records (family tree) on e-Devlet

Steps

1. Know who you will see in the listYour ancestors (üst soy) are your direct line upwards: your mother, father, grandparents and their parents. Your descendants (alt soy) are your children, grandchildren and their children. The General Directorate of Population and Citizenship Affairs (NVİ) states that, under Article 44 of Population Services Law No. 5490, information can only be given about the record holder, their spouse and their direct ancestors and descendants, not about collateral relatives such as siblings, uncles, aunts and their children. So don't look for your siblings or cousins in this list.
2. Open the service page on e-Devlet safelyType turkiye.gov.tr into your browser's address bar yourself; don't click links that arrive by email, text message or ads. To go straight to the service, use turkiye.gov.tr/nvi-alt-ust-soy-bilgisi-sorgulama. If you start from the home page, type "Alt-Üst Soy" in the search box and select "Nüfus ve Vatandaşlık İşleri Genel Müdürlüğü / Alt-Üst Soy Bilgisi Sorgulama" from the results. The service name stays in Turkish even when you switch e-Devlet to English.
3. Sign in with Kimliğimi Şimdi DoğrulaIf you're not signed in, the page shows the warning "Henüz kimliğinizi doğrulamadınız..." (You haven't verified your identity yet). Select the "Kimliğimi Şimdi Doğrula" (Verify my identity now) button and choose the method that suits you: e-Devlet Şifresi (password), Mobil İmza (mobile signature), Elektronik İmza (electronic signature), T.C. Kimlik Kartı (ID card) or İnternet Bankacılığı (internet banking). With an e-Devlet password, enter your ID number and password; for the other methods, follow the on-screen instructions.
4. Review your ancestry listOnce you're signed in, the Alt-Üst Soy Bilgisi Sorgulama screen opens and shows the ancestors and descendants linked to you in the population records. If there is an information text or a choice on the screen, read it first. Check how each person in the list is related to you, and ask older family members about any name you don't recognise. To keep the result, use the download or print option offered on the screen; if you'd like a visual family tree, continue with the steps below.
5. Understand why some ancestors are missingAccording to NVİ, today's population records were set up with the General Population Census of 1904-1905, and only people who were alive at that time were registered. People who had died before then were not entered in the family registers, so their records can't be reached. That's why the list stopping at a certain generation is not an error.
6. Open Soyağacı Sorgulama for a visual family treeTo build a visual family tree from the same data, go to www.nvi.gov.tr and select e-Hizmetler → e-Sorgulamalar → Soyağacı Sorgulama; the service is also listed among the NVİ services on e-Devlet. Sign in with e-Devlet. According to NVİ, the service is open to citizens over 18 who have an e-Devlet account, everyone can see only their own family tree, and in its first stage the app shows only your ancestors.
7. Design your family tree and download it as PNGUse the Arka Plan (Background), Şekil (Shape), Renk (Colour) and Font options on the left and top of the screen to change the design, and select and move any boxes that spill outside the background so they fit. Save the version you like with the "indir" (download) button in the bottom-left corner as a high-resolution PNG; to start over, select "sıfırla" (reset) at the bottom right. Only the design changes in the app: you can't delete people or correct details, and the agency logos in the background can't be removed. To print it, copy the PNG file to a USB stick or external drive and take it to be printed.
8. Get a population register copy for official useIf an institution asks you to document your lineage, NVİ points to the population register copy (nüfus kayıt örneği): people can look up the register copies of themselves and their ancestors or descendants on e-Devlet using secure identity verification and hand the result to the relevant authority on paper or electronically. Use the "Nüfus Kayıt Örneği Belgesi Sorgulama" service on e-Devlet for this. Ask the institution in advance which document it accepts.
9. Ask a population office for what you can't find on e-DevletAccording to NVİ, ancestor and descendant records can be looked up on e-Devlet; if that isn't possible, they can be requested from any district population office. You can also get population register copies showing your ancestors and descendants who were alive and registered in 1904-1905 from the population office where you are. If an ancestor who has died still appears as alive in the register, apply to the population office with the death certificate; if there is no document, you can apply to the district population office with a petition listing the names and addresses of people who know about the death and the date or year of death.