It was announced in early August that the complete archive of Ellis Island Records is now online for free at FamilySearch. Ellis Island was the entry point for millions of immigrants to the U.S. The Ellis Island Immigration Station has millions of passenger arrival records. A complete collection of these passenger lists is now available and searchable at FamilySearch.

These records cover more than half of the nation’s history, spanning the “Great Wave” of immigration (188os to early 1920s). The records also include a variety of transportation types, including cargo ships and airlines.

Early records include a full name, age, gender, occupation, nationality, intended destination, name of ship, and date of arrival. Later records also name traveling companions and relatives “back home” or in the United States. You may also learn a relative’s marital status, physical description, last permanent residence, or birthplace.

This searchable index contains over 25 million names of immigrants and international passengers who arrived at Ellis Island from 1892 to 1924. Once you find a name of interest, you can click through to view individual record images at FamilySearch.

Not only does the index contain the records from 1892 to 1924, but it also contains New York passenger and crew lists from 1925 to 1957. In this index there are nearly 29 million indexed names and over 5 million record images for these post-Ellis Island-era arrivals.

If you are not sure when your immigrant ancestors arrived in the U.S., try using this tip: If they were alive between 1900 and 1930, look them up in the 1900, 1910, 1920, 0r 1930 U.S. censuses. In any of those records there is a column indicating their year of arrival.      –[Source: FamilySearch, What’s New]