[git] What is the difference between pull and clone in git?

git clone is how you get a local copy of an existing repository to work on. It's usually only used once for a given repository, unless you want to have multiple working copies of it around. (Or want to get a clean copy after messing up your local one...)

git pull (or git fetch + git merge) is how you update that local copy with new commits from the remote repository. If you are collaborating with others, it is a command that you will run frequently.

As your first example shows, it is possible to emulate git clone with an assortment of other git commands, but it's not really the case that git pull is doing "basically the same thing" as git clone (or vice-versa).

Examples related to git

Does the target directory for a git clone have to match the repo name? Git fatal: protocol 'https' is not supported Git is not working after macOS Update (xcrun: error: invalid active developer path (/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools) git clone: Authentication failed for <URL> destination path already exists and is not an empty directory SSL_connect: SSL_ERROR_SYSCALL in connection to github.com:443 GitLab remote: HTTP Basic: Access denied and fatal Authentication How can I switch to another branch in git? VS 2017 Git Local Commit DB.lock error on every commit How to remove an unpushed outgoing commit in Visual Studio?

Examples related to clone

git clone error: RPC failed; curl 56 OpenSSL SSL_read: SSL_ERROR_SYSCALL, errno 10054 git: fatal: I don't handle protocol '??http' How to make a copy of an object in C# How create a new deep copy (clone) of a List<T>? "fatal: Not a git repository (or any of the parent directories)" from git status How to copy java.util.list Collection How to jQuery clone() and change id? Copying a HashMap in Java jquery clone div and append it after specific div jQuery Clone table row

Examples related to pull

Your configuration specifies to merge with the <branch name> from the remote, but no such ref was fetched.? How do I force Kubernetes to re-pull an image? Error: Cannot pull with rebase: You have unstaged changes git pull from master into the development branch Trying to git pull with error: cannot open .git/FETCH_HEAD: Permission denied git pull error :error: remote ref is at but expected How to merge remote master to local branch How to undo a git pull? Discard all and get clean copy of latest revision? What is the difference between pull and clone in git?