The answers that suggest git pull
or git fetch
are correct.
The message is generated when git status
sees a difference between .git/FETCH_HEAD
and .git/refs/remotes/<repository>/<branch>
(e.g. .git/refs/remotes/origin/master
).
The latter file records the HEAD from the last fetch (for the repository/branch). Doing git fetch
updates both files to the branch's current HEAD.
Of course if there is nothing to fetch (because the local repository is already up-to-date) then .git/FETCH_HEAD
doesn't change.