Veterans Legacy Memorial vs a Family Memorial Page: What Each One Gives You
The short answer: if your veteran is buried in a VA national cemetery, a state or tribal veterans' cemetery, a military or National Park Service cemetery, or in a private cemetery under a government headstone or marker, the Department of Veterans Affairs has very likely built them a page on the Veterans Legacy Memorial (VLM) already. It is free, it is permanent, and it records their service. It is the VA's page, though, not yours: it is public, everything added to it is reviewed before it appears, and it is shaped around a service record. A family memorial page is the place for the rest of their life. Most families who care about this end up with both, linked to each other.
This guide is for the weeks after a funeral, when someone in the family asks, "Should we make a page for Dad?" and someone else says, "Doesn't the VA already do that?"
What the Veterans Legacy Memorial is
VLM is an online memorial the VA runs for nearly ten million veterans and service members. Each page is built automatically from burial records: name, branch of service, rank, dates of service, war period, decorations where the record has them, and the cemetery and grave location.
Nobody has to apply for it. If your veteran qualifies, the page exists whether or not the family knows about it, and you can find it by searching their name on the VA's VLM site.
Who is covered, in the VA's own terms:
- veterans and service members buried in VA national cemeteries
- those in state and tribal veterans' cemeteries funded by VA grants
- those in Department of Defense (Army and Air Force) and National Park Service cemeteries
- since 2023, veterans buried in private cemeteries whose graves have a government headstone, marker or medallion
If your veteran was cremated and the ashes are at home, or buried privately with no government marker, there may be no page. For a private-cemetery burial, applying for a government headstone, marker or medallion after the fact (the VA allows that; our veteran burial benefits guide walks through it) is the usual route onto VLM.
What you can add to it
Anyone can leave a written tribute without creating an account; you enter a name and email address with it. Family and friends can also upload photographs, a biography and documents such as discharge papers or letters.
Everything submitted is reviewed by VA staff before it appears, to keep the site to the same standard of dignity as a national cemetery. That is a reasonable rule for a government memorial with millions of pages, and it has consequences worth knowing in advance:
- There is a delay. A tribute posted on the morning of Veterans Day may not show until later. Write ahead of the dates that matter.
- Some things will not pass. A wedding photo is fine; the story of the bar fight in Saigon that everyone laughs about at Thanksgiving may not be the kind of thing a reviewer approves.
- You do not decide who sees it. VLM pages are public. You cannot give the page to the family only.
- You do not decide what it says. The service details come from the burial record. If they are wrong, the fix is correcting the record with the VA, not editing the page.
None of this is a criticism. VLM was built to make sure no veteran is forgotten, and for veterans with no surviving family it is often the only memorial anyone sees. It does that job well.
What a family page is for
A family page answers a different question. VLM asks, "Who served?" A family page asks, "Who was he?"
The person in the uniform photograph was also a husband for fifty-one years, a terrible golfer, the one who made pancakes on Sunday, a grandfather who taught three grandchildren to drive. Service may have been two years of a long life. A family page holds all of it:
| Veterans Legacy Memorial | Family memorial page | |
|---|---|---|
| Who builds it | The VA, from burial records | You |
| Cost | Free | Depends on the site; many have a free tier |
| Who can see it | Everyone | You choose (public, by link or code, or private) |
| What it centers | Military service | The whole life |
| Who approves additions | VA reviewers | The family managers |
| Who can edit the core details | Nobody; correct the record with the VA | The family managers |
| Video and recordings | Not the focus | Usually yes |
| Several family members managing it | No | Usually yes |
On GetMemorial, a page has photo and video albums, a life story written in sections, and a guest book where visitors leave messages and light a candle. You can make it public, open only to people with an access code, or visible only to you, and you can add co-managers so a sister in Ohio and a son in Texas can both add to it. If you want to see what finished pages look like before deciding, memorial website examples walks through eight.
When the VA page is enough
Sometimes it genuinely is. A family page takes work, and grief does not leave much room for projects. VLM is probably enough if:
- the family is small and nobody wants to maintain anything
- service was the center of their life and the way they would have wanted to be remembered
- most of the people who would visit are fellow veterans rather than family
In that case, spend the energy on the VA page itself. Add a good photograph, a short biography and the discharge papers, and ask a few relatives and old unit friends to leave tributes. A VLM page with ten tributes on it is a very different thing from one built only from a burial record.
When to add a family page
A family page is worth it when any of these is true:
- Service was one chapter. They served two years and then spent forty running a hardware store. The VA page will only ever know about the two years.
- You want a private place. Some families want somewhere only relatives can read, especially when the death was hard or the stories are personal.
- The family is scattered. Co-managers let each branch of the family add what they know, without one person becoming the bottleneck.
- There is video or voice. Home movies, a recorded interview, the speech at the 50th anniversary. Our guide to preserving a loved one's voice covers getting old recordings into a usable shape.
- They were never eligible for VLM. Cremated and kept at home, buried privately without a government marker, or a service member whose records never reached the VA's burial system.
How to make the two work together
Most families who do both treat VLM as the official record and the family page as the living one.
- Find the VLM page first. Check the details. If the branch, rank or dates are wrong, gather the discharge papers (the DD-214) and contact the VA about the record before anything else.
- Give VLM the service story. Upload the uniform photograph, the discharge papers and a short biography of their service. Leave a family tribute.
- Build the family page around the whole life. Start with one good photograph, a short life story and an invitation to relatives. How to create a free online memorial covers the first hour step by step; online memorial for a parent covers splitting the work between siblings.
- Link them. Put the VLM link on the family page's life story, near the service section. Mention the family page in your VLM tribute so people who find him there know where the rest of the story is.
- Come back on the dates. Veterans Day and Memorial Day are when people visit VLM. Birthdays and anniversaries are when family visit the family page. Our Veterans Day guide has what families do on November 11.
A word on other sites
You may also find your veteran on Find a Grave or BillionGraves, put there by volunteers who photograph headstones. Those pages are public, and in most cases the person who created them, not the family, manages them. If that bothers you, our Find a Grave alternatives guide explains what you can and cannot change there.
Quick answers
Is there a free online memorial for veterans? Yes. The VA's Veterans Legacy Memorial is free and is created automatically for veterans buried in VA, state, tribal, military and National Park Service cemeteries, and for those in private cemeteries with a government headstone or marker.
Can family edit a Veterans Legacy Memorial page? Family can add photos, a biography, documents and tributes, which VA staff review before posting. The service details come from VA records and are corrected through the VA, not edited on the page.
Can I make a VLM page private? No. VLM pages are public. If you want a private or family-only memorial, that needs a separate page.
My veteran was cremated and the ashes are at home. Do they have a VLM page? Probably not, because VLM is built from burial and marker records. Ask the VA what your veteran is eligible for; a government headstone, marker or medallion is what usually brings a veteran onto VLM. If they are not eligible, a family page is where their memorial lives.
GetMemorial helps families build beautiful, lasting online memorials in minutes — a permanent home for the whole story, the uniform photograph and everything after it. Build yours at GetMemorial.com.
