Question

How to rename a local Git branch via the command line?

Posted on November 6, 2020
Linux Basics Linux Commands Git
Asked by Bobby Iliev

More often than not, I would create a new branch with git checkout -b branch_name and I would realize that I’ve made a typo or I would come up with a better name for the branch later on.

If I have just created the branch it is ok as I can create a new one, but sometimes I would notice this after a couple of commits.

So here’s how you could rename a local Git branch via your command line!

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Bobby Iliev

Site Moderator

• November 6, 2020

Accepted Answer

If you want to test this on a fresh new repository, then you can do the following prep work:

Quickly create a new folder and cd into it:

mkdir my-repo ; cd my-repo

Then initialize a new git repository:

git init .

After that create a new branch:

git checkout -b wrong-branch-name

Then check your the available branches with the following command:

git branch

Output:

  main
* wrong-branch-name

Then similar in order to rename the branch you could just run the following command:

git branch -m wrong-branch-name correct-branch-name

If you want to rename your current branch, you could just run the following:

git branch -m my-branch-name

After that, if you run git branch again you will be able to see the correct branch name!

An easy way to remember the -m flag is from the mv command in Linux, the mv command is used to move files but also rename them, just like the -m flag for Git!

This is pretty much it! Hope that this helps. Regards, Bobby