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There’s A One In 300 Chance That Every Stranger You See Is Your Cousin

People are surrounded by relatives every day without even knowing it, according to research that says there’s a one in 300 chance that every stranger you see is your cousin.

According to a demographic analysis by genealogy site AncestryDNA, the average Brit has 193,000 living cousins - enough to fill Wembley Stadium twice.

On average, that would mean potentially encountering about two relatives in every square mile travelled across Britain.

Relatives that are sixth cousins or closer and share a traceable ancestor born within the last 200 years are counted in the figures.

While the stats are relatively surprising, one in 300 still represents a fairly remote chance of bumping into a distant relative without knowing it.

Researchers used birth rates and census data from the last 200 years to create a model to estimate how many close living cousins an average Brit has.

Ancestry.com recently announced the launch of its DNA-testing kits in the UK, with a price tag of £99.

The site helps people to discover and connect with living family members using a network of over 16 billion records and 70 million family trees.

(Image credit: Ray Tang/REX)