Liverpool & South West Lancashire FHS - Forum

'A wildcard character placed in a name tells the search engine to count any letter as a match and will return a diversity of search results... When you want to use a wildcard, select a character in the word you're searching and replace it with either an asterisk (*) or a question mark (?).

By using an asterisk, you're telling the computer that the * can represent more than one letter...

On the other hand, using a question mark instead limits the wildcard to just one character.'

https://blog.findmypast.com.au/maximize ... 47889.html

That's a great idea. On Ancestry you need three letters before the wildcard or it won't accept your search.