How do I discard unstaged changes in Git

Question

How do I discard changes in my working copy that are not in the index

User · Answer

You can use git stash - if something goes wrong, you can still revert from the stash. Similar to some other answer here, but this one also removes all unstaged files and also all unstaged deletes:

git add .
git stash

if you check that everything is OK, throw the stash away:

git stash drop

The answer from Bilal Maqsood with git clean also worked for me, but with the stash I have more control - if I do sth accidentally, I can still get my changes back

UPDATE

I think there is 1 more change (don't know why this worked for me before):

git add . -A instead of git add .

without the -A the removed files will not be staged

User · Answer

git clean -df   Cleans the working tree by recursively removing files that are not under version control  starting from the current directory   -d  Remove untracked directories in addition to untracked files  -f  Force  might be not necessary depending on  clean requireForce setting   Run git help clean to see the manual

User · Answer

In my opinion   git clean -df   should do the trick  As per Git documentation on git clean     git-clean - Remove untracked files from the working tree   Description      Cleans the working tree by recursively removing files that   are not under version control  starting from the current directory       Normally  only files unknown to Git are removed  but if the -x option   is specified  ignored files are also removed  This can  for example    be useful to remove all build products       If any optional     arguments are given  only those paths are   affected    Options     -d Remove untracked directories in addition to untracked files  If an untracked directory is managed by a different Git repository  it is   not removed by default  Use -f option twice if you really want to   remove such a directory       -f   --force If the Git configuration variable clean requireForce is not set to false  git clean will refuse to run unless given -f  -n or -i

User · Answer

Since no answer suggests the exact option combination that I use  here it is  git clean -dxn      dry-run to inspect the list of files-to-be-removed git clean -dxf      REMOVE ignored untracked files  in the current directory  git checkout --     ERASE changes in tracked files  in the current directory   This is the online help text for the used git clean options  -d Remove untracked directories in addition to untracked files  If an untracked directory is managed by a different Git repository  it is not removed by default  Use -f option twice if you really want to remove such a directory  -x Don   t use the standard ignore rules read from  gitignore  per directory  and  GIT DIR info exclude  but do still use the ignore rules given with -e options  This allows removing all untracked files  including build products  This can be used  possibly in conjunction with git reset  to create a pristine working directory to test a clean build  -n Don   t actually remove anything  just show what would be done  -f If the Git configuration variable clean requireForce is not set to false  Git clean will refuse to delete files or directories unless given -f  -n  or -i  Git will refuse to delete directories within the  git subdirectory or file  unless a second -f is given

User · Answer

If you aren t interested in keeping the unstaged changes  especially if the staged changes are new files   I found this handy   git diff   git apply --reverse

User · Answer

simply say  git stash   It will remove all your local changes  You also can use later by saying  git stash apply    or      git stash pop

User · Answer

To do a permanent discard  git reset --hard  To save changes for later  git stash

User · Answer

As you type git status    use  git checkout --      to discard changes in working directory  is shown   e g  git checkout --

User · Answer

Just use   git stash -u   Done  Easy   If you really care about your stash stack then you can follow with git stash drop  But at that point you re better off using  from Mariusz Nowak    git checkout --   git clean -df   Nonetheless  I like git stash -u the best because it  discards  all tracked and untracked changes in just one command  Yet git checkout --   only discards tracked changes  and git clean -df only discards untracked changes    and typing both commands is far too much work

User · Answer

2019 update You can now discard unstaged changes in one tracked file with  git restore  lt file gt   and in all tracked files in the current directory  recursively  with  git restore    If you run the latter from the root of the repo  it will discard unstaged changes in all tracked files  Notes  git restore was introduced in July 2019 and released in version 2 23 as part of a split of the git checkout command into git restore for files and git switch for branches  git checkout still behaves as it used to and the older answers remain perfectly valid  When running git status with unstaged changes in the working tree  this is now what Git suggests to use to discard them  instead of git checkout --  lt file gt  as it used to prior to v2 23   As with git checkout --    this only discards changes in tracked files  So Mariusz Nowak s answer still applies and if you want to discard all unstaged changes  including untracked files  you could run  as he suggests  an additional git clean -df

User · Answer

None of the solutions work if you just changed the permissions of a file  this is on DOS Windoze    Mon 23 11 2015-15 16 34 80 C      work checkout slf4j   git status On branch SLF4J 1 5 3 Changes not staged for commit     use  git add      to update what will be committed     use  git checkout --      to discard changes in working directory           modified     gitignore         modified    LICENSE txt         modified    TODO txt         modified    codeStyle xml         modified    pom xml         modified    version pl  no changes added to commit  use  git add  and or  git commit -a    Mon 23 11 2015-15 16 37 87 C      work checkout slf4j   git diff diff --git a  gitignore b  gitignore old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a LICENSE txt b LICENSE txt old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a TODO txt b TODO txt old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a codeStyle xml b codeStyle xml old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a pom xml b pom xml old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a version pl b version pl old mode 100644 new mode 100755  Mon 23 11 2015-15 16 45 22 C      work checkout slf4j   git reset --hard HEAD HEAD is now at 8fa8488 12133-CHIXMISSINGMESSAGES MALCOLMBOEKHOFF 20141223124940 Added  gitignore  Mon 23 11 2015-15 16 47 42 C      work checkout slf4j   git clean -f  Mon 23 11 2015-15 16 53 49 C      work checkout slf4j   git stash save -u Saved working directory and index state WIP on SLF4J 1 5 3  8fa8488 12133-CHIXMISSINGMESSAGES MALCOLMBOEKHOFF 20141223124940 Added  gitignore HEAD is now at 8fa8488 12133-CHIXMISSINGMESSAGES MALCOLMBOEKHOFF 20141223124940 Added  gitignore  Mon 23 11 2015-15 17 00 40 C      work checkout slf4j   git stash drop Dropped refs stash  0   cb4966e9b1e9c9d8daa79ab94edc0c1442a294dd   Mon 23 11 2015-15 17 06 75 C      work checkout slf4j   git stash drop Dropped refs stash  0   e6c49c470f433ce344e305c5b778e810625d0529   Mon 23 11 2015-15 17 08 90 C      work checkout slf4j   git stash drop No stash found   Mon 23 11 2015-15 17 15 21 C      work checkout slf4j   git checkout --    Mon 23 11 2015-15 22 00 68 C      work checkout slf4j   git checkout -f --    Mon 23 11 2015-15 22 04 53 C      work checkout slf4j   git status On branch SLF4J 1 5 3 Changes not staged for commit     use  git add      to update what will be committed     use  git checkout --      to discard changes in working directory           modified     gitignore         modified    LICENSE txt         modified    TODO txt         modified    codeStyle xml         modified    pom xml         modified    version pl  no changes added to commit  use  git add  and or  git commit -a    Mon 23 11 2015-15 22 13 06 C      work checkout slf4j   git diff diff --git a  gitignore b  gitignore old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a LICENSE txt b LICENSE txt old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a TODO txt b TODO txt old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a codeStyle xml b codeStyle xml old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a pom xml b pom xml old mode 100644 new mode 100755 diff --git a version pl b version pl old mode 100644 new mode 100755   The only way to fix this is to manually reset the permissions on the changed files    Mon 23 11 2015-15 25 43 79 C      work checkout slf4j   git status -s   egrep    M    cut -c4-   for  f  usebackq tokens   delims    A in   more   do chmod 644   A  Mon 23 11 2015-15 25 55 37 C      work checkout slf4j   git status On branch SLF4J 1 5 3 nothing to commit  working directory clean  Mon 23 11 2015-15 25 59 28 C      work checkout slf4j    Mon 23 11 2015-15 26 31 12 C      work checkout slf4j   git diff

User · Answer

You could create your own alias which describes how to do it in a descriptive way   I use the next alias to discard changes     Discard changes in a  list of  file s  in working tree  discard   checkout --   Then you can use it as next to discard all changes   discard     Or just a file   discard filename     Otherwise  if you want to discard all changes and also the untracked files  I use a mix of checkout and clean   Clean and discard changes and untracked files in working tree  cleanout    git clean -df  amp  amp  git checkout --     So the use is simple as next   cleanout     Now is available in the next Github repo which contains a lot of aliases    https   github com GitAlias gitalias

User · Answer

Another quicker way is   git stash save --keep-index --include-untracked   You don t need to include --include-untracked if you don t want to be thorough about it   After that  you can drop that stash with a git stash drop command if you like

User · Answer

This checks out the current index for the current directory  throwing away all changes in files from the current directory downwards   git checkout     or this which checks out all files from the index  overwriting working tree files   git checkout-index -a -f

User · Answer

Another way to get rid of new files that is more specific than git clean -df  it will allow you to get rid of some files not necessarily all   is to add the new files to the index first  then stash  then drop the stash   This technique is useful when  for some reason  you can t easily delete all of the untracked files by some ordinary mechanism  like rm

User · Answer

No matter what state your repo is in you can always reset to any previous commit   git reset --hard  lt commit hash gt      This will discard all changes which were made after that commit

User · Answer

If all the staged files were actually committed  then the branch can simply be reset e g  from your GUI with about three mouse clicks  Branch  Reset  Yes   So what I often do in practice to revert unwanted local changes is to commit all the good stuff  and then reset the branch   If the good stuff is committed in a single commit  then you can use  amend last commit  to bring it back to being staged or unstaged if you d ultimately  like to commit it a little differently   This might not be the technical solution you are looking for to your problem  but I find it a very practical solution  It allows you to discard unstaged changes selectively  resetting the changes you don t like and keeping the ones you do   So in summary  I simply do commit  branch reset  and amend last commit

User · Answer

you have a very simple git command git checkout

User · Answer

cd path to project folder    take you to your project folder working directory  git checkout                 removes all unstaged changes in working directory

User · Answer

The easiest way to do this is by using this command   This command is used to discard changes in working directory -  git checkout --     https   git-scm com docs git-checkout   In git command  stashing of untracked files is achieved by using   git stash -u   http   git-scm com docs git-stash

User · Answer

If it s almost impossible to rule out modifications of the files  have you considered ignoring them  If this statement is right and you wouldn t touch those files during your development  this command may be useful    git update-index --assume-unchanged file to ignore

User · Answer

Just use   git stash -k -u   This will stash unstaged changes and untracked files  new files  and keep staged files   It s better than reset checkout clean  because you might want them back later  by git stash pop   Keeping them in the stash is better than discarding them

User · Answer

If you merely wish to remove changes to existing files  use checkout  documented here     git checkout --      No branch is specified  so it checks out the current branch   The double-hyphen  --  tells Git that what follows should be taken as its second argument  path   that you skipped specification of a branch  The period     indicates all paths     If you want to remove files added since your last commit  use clean  documented here     git clean -i     The -i option initiates an interactive clean  to prevent mistaken deletions   A handful of other options are available for a quicker execution  see the documentation     If you wish to move changes to a holding space for later access  use stash  documented here     git stash    All changes will be moved to Git s Stash  for possible later access   A handful of options are available for more nuanced stashing  see the documentation

User · Answer

I had a weird situation where a file is always unstaged  this helps me to resolve      git rm  gitattributes   git add -A   git reset --hard

User · Answer

I really found this article helpful for explaining when to use what command  http   www szakmeister net blog 2011 oct 12 reverting-changes-git   There are a couple different cases    If you haven t staged the file  then you use git checkout   Checkout  updates files in the working tree to match the version in the index    If the files have not been staged  aka added to the index     this command will essentially revert the files to what your last commit was     git checkout -- foo txt If you have staged the file  then use git reset   Reset changes the index to match a commit   git reset -- foo txt    I suspect that using git stash is a popular choice since it s a little less dangerous   You can always go back to it if you accidently blow too much away when using git reset   Reset is recursive by default   Take a look at the article above for further advice

User · Answer

Tried all the solutions above but still couldn t get rid of new  unstaged files   Use git clean -f to remove those new files - with caution though  Note the force option

User · Answer

For all unstaged files in current working directory use  git checkout --    For a specific file use  git checkout -- path to file to revert  -- here to remove argument disambiguation  For Git 2 23 onwards  one may want to use the more specific git restore    resp  git restore path to file to revert  that together with git switch replaces the overloaded git checkout  see here   and thus removes the argument disambiguation

User · Answer

My favorite is  git checkout -p   That lets you selectively revert chunks   See also   git add -p

User · Answer

If you are in case of submodule and no other solutions work try    To check what is the problem  maybe a  dirty  case  use   git diff To remove stash  git submodule update

User · Answer

What follows is really only a solution if you are working with a fork of a repository where you regularly synchronize  e g  pull request  with another repo  Short answer  delete fork and refork  but read the warnings on github   I had a similar problem  perhaps not identical  and I m sad to say my solution is not ideal  but it is ultimately effective   I would often have git status messages like this  involving at least 2 4 files      git status   Not currently on any branch    Changes to be committed       use  git reset HEAD  lt file gt      to unstage            modified    doc PROJECT MEDIUM ATS-constraint constraint s2var dats         modified    doc PROJECT MEDIUM ATS-constraint parsing parsing s2var dats     Changes not staged for commit       use  git add  lt file gt      to update what will be committed       use  git checkout --  lt file gt      to discard changes in working directory            modified    doc PROJECT MEDIUM ATS-constraint constraint s2Var dats         modified    doc PROJECT MEDIUM ATS-constraint parsing parsing s2Var dats   A keen eye will note that these files have dopplegangers that are a single letter in case off  Somehow  and I have no idea what led me down this path to start with  as I was not working with these files myself from the upstream repo   I had switched these files  Try the many solutions listed on this page  and other pages  did not seem to help    I was able to fix the problem by deleting my forked repository and all local repositories  and reforking  This alone was not enough  upstream had to rename the files in question to new filenames  As long as you don t have any uncommited work  no wikis  and no issues that diverge from the upstream repository  you should be just fine  Upstream may not be very happy with you  to say the least  As for my problem  it is undoubtedly a user error as I m not that proficient with git  but the fact that it is far from easy to fix points to an issue with git as well

User · Answer

Instead of discarding changes  I reset my remote to the origin  Note - this method is to completely restore your folder to that of the repo    So I do this to make sure they don t sit there when I git reset  later - excludes gitignores on the Origin branchname   NOTE  If you want to keep files not yet tracked  but not in GITIGNORE you may wish to skip this step  as it will Wipe these untracked files not found on your remote repository  thanks  XtrmJosh    git add --all   Then I   git fetch --all   Then I reset to origin  git reset --hard origin branchname   That will put it back to square one  Just like RE-Cloning the branch  WHILE keeping all my gitignored files locally and in place   Updated per user comment below  Variation to reset the to whatever current branch the user is on    git reset --hard   u

User · Answer

This works even in directories that are  outside of normal git permissions   sudo chmod -R 664      amp  amp  git checkout --    amp  amp  git clean -dfx   Happened to me recently

User · Answer

When you want to transfer a stash to someone else     add files git add       diff all the changes to a file git diff --staged  gt    mijn-fix diff   remove local changes  git reset  amp  amp  git checkout      later you can re-apply the diff   git apply   mijn-fix diff    edit  as commented  it   s possible to name stashes  Well  use this if you want to share your stash

User · Answer

git checkout -f    man git-checkout   -f  --force  When switching branches  proceed even if the index or the working tree differs from HEAD  This is used to throw away local changes   When checking out paths from the index  do not fail upon unmerged entries  instead  unmerged entries are ignored

User · Answer

It seems like the complete solution is   git clean -df git checkout --     git clean removes all untracked files  warning  while it won t delete ignored files mentioned directly in  gitignore  it may delete ignored files residing in folders  and git checkout clears all unstaged changes

User · Answer

Just as a reminder  newer versions of git has the restore command  which also is a suggestion when typing git status when you have changed files   use  quot git add     quot  to update what will be committed   use  quot git restore     quot  to discard changes in working directory  So git  restore  is the modern solution to this  It is always a good idea to read the suggestions from git after typing  git status   -

[git] How do I discard unstaged changes in Git?

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