What Dog DNA Tests Detect: Breed, Health, Traits, and Relatives

A dog DNA report is more than a breed pie chart. Across both major brands the report has five or six distinct sections, each answering a different question. Knowing what is in each section helps you decide which kit to buy and how much value you are getting at the price.

1. Breed ancestry

This is the headline. The report compares your dog’s genome against a reference panel of recognized breeds and returns a percentage breakdown. Embark covers 350+ breeds. Wisdom Panel covers 350+ breeds. For purebred dogs the result is reliably one breed at close to 100 percent. For mixed-breed dogs the result is a percentage chart across the breeds the algorithm identifies in segments of the genome.

For how this actually works, see dog DNA breed identification explained. For accuracy, see dog DNA test accuracy.

2. Health screening

The health section reports your dog’s genotype at specific variants known to be associated with inherited conditions. Embark screens 250+ conditions. Wisdom Panel Premium screens 210+. Wisdom Panel Essential omits this entire section.

Categories include:

• Drug sensitivity markers (MDR1 is the most important).
• Bleeding disorders (von Willebrand subtypes, hemophilia variants).
• Eye conditions (progressive retinal atrophy variants).
• Neurological conditions (degenerative myelopathy and others).
• Cardiac conditions (breed-specific cardiomyopathy variants).
• Breed-typical inherited diseases across many other categories.

A flagged result is screening context, not a veterinary diagnosis. For detail, see dog DNA health screening explained.

3. Traits

The traits section reports genetic variants associated with physical and behavioral characteristics. Both brands report:

• Coat type, length, and curl
• Coat color and pattern (including merle, brindle, and ticking variants)
• Body size prediction (especially useful for puppies)
• Some behavioral predispositions (Embark goes further here than Wisdom Panel, with markers for things like high-altitude adaptation and a couple of behavioral tendencies)

Traits are mostly entertainment value, but body-size prediction is genuinely useful for puppy owners trying to anticipate how large their dog will grow.

4. Genetic diversity and inbreeding coefficient

Embark reports a genetic diversity score and an inbreeding coefficient (COI). This measures how related your dog’s parents were to each other, based on shared genome segments. A high COI means your dog has reduced genetic diversity, which carries health implications (higher background risk of recessive conditions surfacing).

Wisdom Panel reports a similar relatedness summary but does not emphasize the COI metric in the same way.

For breeders this is genuinely important. For pet owners it is interesting context, particularly for purebred dogs from small breed populations.

5. Relative Finder (Embark only)

Embark’s Relative Finder compares your dog’s genome against every other Embark-tested dog and surfaces dogs that share DNA segments. The closer the shared segments, the closer the genetic relationship: full siblings, half siblings, parent-offspring, or more distant relatives.

For rescue and mixed-breed owners this is genuinely unique and occasionally emotionally significant. We have seen Relative Finder surface littermates of rescue dogs adopted out separately. Wisdom Panel does not offer this feature.

For the head-to-head, see Embark vs Wisdom Panel.

6. Estimated adult weight (for puppies)

Both brands offer a predicted adult weight for puppies, based on identified breeds and growth-related genetic markers. Useful for new puppy owners sizing crates, planning food budgets, and setting expectations.

What the report does not detect

To round out the inventory, here is what is not in any consumer dog DNA report:

• Acquired disease. The test reads your dog’s DNA at birth; it does not see infections, injuries, or environmentally caused conditions.
• Most cancers. A small number of cancer-predisposition variants are on the panel for specific breeds; the vast majority of canine cancers are not on any consumer DNA panel.
• Vaccination status, parasite load, or anything else that is not in the germline DNA.
• Behavior predictions in any robust sense. The behavioral markers on the panels are interesting but should not be over-read.
• Most structural variants and complex multi-gene conditions.

Related reading

How dog DNA tests work, dog DNA test accuracy, dog DNA health screening explained, and the pet DNA testing guide.