How to get the current branch name in Git

Question

I m from a Subversion background and  when I had a branch  I knew what I was working on with  These working files point to this branch    But with Git I m not sure when I am editing a file in NetBeans or Notepad    whether it s tied to the master or another branch   There s no problem with git in bash  it tells me what I m doing

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To display the current branch you re on  without the other branches listed  you can do the following   git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD   Reference    Show just the current branch in Git  Sep 2009

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Using earlier ideas  assuming sha1 is 40 characters  and chasing references   yea  should delete the debug print lines  -    git reflog   awk    3     checkout    amp  amp   sha          sha     1       from   NF - 2    to  NF   print from  to  length from   gt    dev stderr    if  length from     40    print from   exit      sha substr from  1  7    print sha  gt    dev stderr        gives the raw output     git status HEAD detached at 147049c           gime-branch sh a47be8d2167641088b66bf8f5c2bf7d3da0c642c HEAD  40 a47be8d master HEAD  6 master

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For my own reference  but it might be useful to others  I made an overview of most  basic command line  techniques mentioned in this thread  each applied to several use cases  HEAD is  pointing at     local branch  master  remote tracking branch  in sync with local branch  origin master at same commit as master  remote tracking branch  not in sync with a local branch  origin feature-foo  tag  v1 2 3  submodule  run inside the submodule directory  general detached head  none of the above    Results    git branch   sed -n       s   p    local branch  master remote tracking branch  in sync    detached from origin master  remote tracking branch  not in sync    detached from origin feature-foo  tag   detached from v1 2 3  submodule   HEAD detached at 285f294  general detached head   detached from 285f294   git status   head -1   local branch    On branch master remote tracking branch  in sync     HEAD detached at origin master remote tracking branch  not in sync     HEAD detached at origin feature-foo tag    HEAD detached at v1 2 3 submodule    HEAD detached at 285f294 general detached head    HEAD detached at 285f294  git describe --all   local branch  heads master remote tracking branch  in sync   heads master  note  not remotes origin master  remote tracking branch  not in sync   remotes origin feature-foo tag  v1 2 3 submodule  remotes origin HEAD general detached head  v1 0 6-5-g2393761  cat  git HEAD    local branch  ref  refs heads master submodule  cat   git HEAD  Not a directory all other use cases  SHA of the corresponding commit  git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD   local branch  master all the other use cases  HEAD  git symbolic-ref --short HEAD   local branch  master all the other use cases  fatal  ref HEAD is not a symbolic ref     FYI this was done with git version 1 8 3 1

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I have a simple script called git-cbr  current branch  which prints out the current branch name      bin bash  git branch   grep -e        I put this script in a custom folder     bin   The folder is in  PATH   So now when I m in a git repo  I just simply type git cbr to print out the current branch name     git cbr   master   This works because the git command takes its first argument and tries to run a script that goes by the name of git-arg1  For instance  git branch tries to run a script called git-branch  etc

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A less noisy version for git status would do the trick  git status -bsuno   It prints out     branch-name

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As of version 2 22 of git you could just use   git branch --show-current   As per man page      Print the name of the current branch  In detached HEAD state  nothing is printed

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The following shell command tells you the branch that you are currently in   git branch   grep       When you don t want to type that long command every time you want to know the branch and you are using Bash  give the command a short alias  for example alias cb  like so   alias cb  git branch   grep        When you are in branch master and your prompt is    you will get   master as follows     cb   master

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Returns either branch name or SHA1 when on detached head   git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD   grep -v  HEAD     git rev-parse HEAD   This is a short version of  dmaestro12 s answer and without tag support

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Found a command line solution of the same length as Oliver Refalo s  using good ol  awk   git branch   awk        print  2     awk reads that as  do the stuff in    on lines matching the regex   By default it assumes whitespace-delimited fields  so you print the second  If you can assume that only the line with your branch has the    you can drop the     Ah  bash golf

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bin bash function git branch     br  git branch   grep        echo   br        git branch

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You can also see name of current branch in your  git directory of current project   type command in terminal      open  git HEAD output file contains the name of current branch  ref   refs heads  current working branch

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git branch   grep -e        cut -d    -f 2   will show only the branch name

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Use git branch --contains HEAD   tail -1   xargs it also works for  detached HEAD  state

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In Netbeans  ensure that versioning annotations are enabled  View -  Show Versioning Labels   You can then see the branch name next to project name   http   netbeans org bugzilla show bug cgi id 213582

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git branch   grep       sed  s         awk   printf  0     pbcopy   To directly copy the result to the pasteboard  Thanks to  olivier-refalo for the start

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if you run in Jenkins  you can use GIT BRANCH variable as appears here  https   wiki jenkins-ci org display JENKINS Git Plugin The git plugin sets several environment variables you can use in your scripts  GIT COMMIT - SHA of the current GIT BRANCH - Name of the branch currently being used  e g   quot master quot  or  quot origin foo quot  GIT PREVIOUS COMMIT - SHA of the previous built commit from the same branch  the current SHA on first build in branch  GIT URL - Repository remote URL GIT URL N - Repository remote URLs when there are more than 1 remotes  e g  GIT URL 1  GIT URL 2 GIT AUTHOR EMAIL - Committer Author Email GIT COMMITTER EMAIL - Committer Author Email

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Simply  add following lines to your    bash profile   branch show          git branch 2 gt   dev null   sed -e         d  -e  s             1      export PS1   u  h    033 32m   w   033 33m     branch show    033 00m         In this way  you can have the current branch name in Terminal  Courtesy of Coderwall com

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You can do this with a single grep instruction  using Perl mode and  K to reset the match buffer  so you get only the branch name     git branch   grep -oP      s  K S    master

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You can just type in command line  console  on Linux  in the repository directory     git status   and you will see some text  among which something similar to       On branch master       which means you are currently on master branch  If you are editing any file at that moment and it is located in the same local repository  local directory containing the files that are under Git version control management   you are editing file in this branch

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git branch  should show all the local branches of your repo  The starred branch is your current branch  If you want to retrieve only the name of the branch you are on  you can do  git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD  or with Git 2 22 and above  git branch --show-current

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git branch show current branch name only   While git branch will show you all branches and highlight the current one with an asterisk  it can be too cumbersome when working with lots of branches   To show only the branch you are currently on  use   git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD

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One more alternative   git name-rev --name-only HEAD

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I recommend using any of these two commands   git branch   grep -e        cut -d    -f 2  OR  git status   sed -n 1p   cut -d    -f 3  OR  more verbose   git status -uno -bs  cut -d    -f 3   cut -d   -f 1  sed -e  s     t   1   sed -n 1p

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Over time  we might have a really long list of branches   While some of the other solutions are great  Here is what I do  simplified from Jacob s answer    git branch   grep      Now   git status   works  but only If there are any local changes

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You can permanently set up your bash output to show your git-branch name  It is very handy when you work with different branches  no need to type   git status all the time   Github repo git-aware-prompt    Open your terminal  ctrl-alt-t  and enter the commands  mkdir    bash cd    bash git clone git   github com jimeh git-aware-prompt git   Edit your  bashrc with sudo nano    bashrc command  for Ubuntu  and add the following to the top   export GITAWAREPROMPT    bash git-aware-prompt source    GITAWAREPROMPT  main sh    Then paste the code       export PS1     debian chroot     debian chroot     033 01 32m   u  h   033 00m      033 01 34m   w   033 00m      txtcyn    git branch   txtred    git dirty   txtrst         at the end of the same file you pasted the installation code into earlier  This will give you the colorized output

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you  can use git bash on the working directory command is as follow  git status -b   it will tell you on which branch you are on  there are many commands which are useful some of them are   -s   --short Give the output in the short-format   -b --branch Show the branch and tracking info even in short-format   --porcelain    Give the output in an easy-to-parse format for scripts  This is similar to the short output  but will remain stable across Git versions and regardless of user configuration  See below for details   The version parameter is used to specify the format version  This is optional and defaults to the original version v1 format   --long Give the output in the long-format  This is the default   -v --verbose In addition to the names of files that have been changed  also show the textual changes that are staged to be committed  i e   like the output of git diff --cached   If -v is specified twice  then also show the changes in the working tree that have not yet been staged  i e   like the output of git diff

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I know this has been answered already  but in the most recent version of Git the command git branch opens a list of your branches in some kind of prompt that you have to quit out of  Which annoys me to no end   Here s my fix  Open your bash profile and type this in      bin bash git       if           branch     then     command git branch -a   grep -v  remotes    else     command git        fi     Now open Terminal and test it out by typing the following commands in a git repo   source    zshrc git branch    And voila  A list of your local branches is printed out in your terminal   The code you re writing to your bashrc file overwrites the default function for git branch and replaces it with a much longer command that lists all local branches via the -a argument  Then we grep out the extra not needed business and print it out  If you exclude the grep command you ll still get the annoying prompt  If you re not familiar with writing bash commands checkout this explanation  About  bash profile   bashrc  and where should alias be written in

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You have also git symbolic-ref HEAD which displays the full refspec  To show only the branch name in Git v1 8 and later  thank s to Greg for pointing that out   git symbolic-ref --short HEAD  On Git v1 7  you can also do  git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD  Both should give the same branch name if you re on a branch  If you re on a detached head answers differ   Note  On an earlier client  this seems to work  git symbolic-ref HEAD   sed -e  quot s  refs  heads     quot        Darien 26  Mar 2014

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If you really want the last branch tag checked out in detached HEAD state as well   git reflog HEAD   grep  checkout     head -1   rev   cut -d    -f1   rev   Update This is nicer if you have and aren t scared of awk   git reflog HEAD   grep  checkout     head -1   awk   print  NF

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Sorry this is another command-line answer  but that s what I was looking for when I found this question and many of these answers were helpful  My solution is the following bash shell function   get branch          git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD   grep -v HEAD          git describe --exact-match HEAD 2 gt   dev null          git rev-parse HEAD     This should always give me something both human-readable and directly usable as an argument to git checkout    on a local branch  feature HS-0001 on a tagged commit  detached   v3 29 5 on a remote branch  detached  not tagged   SHA1 on any other detached commit  SHA1

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git status    will also give the branch name along with changes   e g    gt git status On branch master     lt -- branch name here

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git symbolic-ref -q --short HEAD   I use this in scripts that need the current branch name  It will show you the current short symbolic reference to HEAD  which will be your current branch name

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In case your CI server does not have environment variable with branch name and you have a dockerized build without git binary inside of container  you can just use   cat  git HEAD   awk -F       print  NF

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I  know this is late but on a linux mac  from the terminal  you can use the following   git status   sed -n 1p   Explanation   git status -  gets the working tree status sed -n 1p -  gets the first line from the status body         Response to the above command will look as follows                                                    On branch your branch name

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Well simple enough  I got it in a one liner  bash   git branch   sed -n       s   p     credit  Limited Atonement   And while I am there  the one liner to get the remote tracking branch  if any   git rev-parse --symbolic-full-name --abbrev-ref   u

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Why not use git-aware shell prompt  which would tell you name of current branch   git status also helps     How git-prompt sh from contrib  does it  git version 2 3 0   as defined in   git ps1 helper function    First  there is special case if rebase in progress is detected   Git uses unnamed branch  detached HEAD  during the rebase process to make it atomic  and original branch is saved elsewhere  If the  git HEAD file is a symbolic link  a very rare case  from the ancient history of Git   it uses git symbolic-ref HEAD 2 gt  dev null Else  it reads  git HEAD file  Next steps depends on its contents    If this file doesn t exist  then there is no current branch   This usually happens if the repository is bare  If it starts with  ref    prefix  then  git HEAD is symref  symbolic reference   and we are on normal branch   Strip this prefix to get full name  and strip refs heads  to get short name of the current branch   b    head ref           b   b  refs heads    If it doesn t start with  ref     then it is detached HEAD  anonymous branch   pointing directly to some commit  Use git describe     to write the current commit in human-readable form     I hope that helps

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Add it to PS1 using Mac     PS1   W  u  gt    -d  git    amp  amp  git branch   grep     cut -d    -f2  gt        Before running the command above       After running that command       Dont worry  if it is not GIT repository   it will not display error because of  -d  git  which checks if  git folder exists or not

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What about this     git symbolic-ref HEAD 2 gt   dev null    git rev-parse --short HEAD 2 gt   dev null     sed  s refs heads

[git] How to get the current branch name in Git?

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