Britannica Sources used in this answer

How much genetic material do humans generally share with one another?

Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.

Overhead view of a diverse group of people standing in a circle, holding each other's hands in a gesture of unity and teamwork. — Race Skin color is one of the variables that has been used to classify people into different racial categories.

Humans share a vast majority of their genetic material, as all members of the species possess a common set of genes that provides the biological constancy of the human population. While individuals exhibit significant morphological differences—such as variations in facial features, skin color, and height—these traits are influenced by both genetic factors and environmental interactions.12

Scientific research has demonstrated that there is no biological basis for dividing humanity into distinct "races" based on genetics. Studies of genetic markers and blood groups have shown that human populations differ only in the frequencies of genes that all populations share, rather than possessing unique, absolute genetic features. Furthermore, internal genetic variation within any given group is consistently found to be greater than the variation between different groups.3

While every individual (with the exception of identical twins) possesses a unique genetic configuration due to the pervasive nature of genetic variation, this diversity exists within the framework of a shared human genome.21