The git commands I actually run every day

Originally published at harshit.cloud on 2026-05-20.

I've been using git for a decade and most of what I type still fits on a single hand. The 200-page Pro Git book is wonderful and almost none of it survives contact with a real Tuesday. What survives is a small, boring set of commands that get rerun constantly, plus a handful of less-boring ones I reach for once a week and would mourn if they disappeared.

This post is that list, ordered by how often my fingers actually type them. Aliases are from the oh-my-zsh git plugin (enabled in most zsh configs that exist); the full command sits next to the alias so it's portable.

the daily eight

These are the ones I'd type in my sleep. If you're not using all eight already, picking them up pays back inside a week.

gst

git status

gst

I run this between every other command. It's the cheapest sanity check git has. Branch, ahead/behind, staged, unstaged, untracked. Two seconds. If you only learn one alias, learn this one.

glola

git log --oneline --graph --decorate --all

glola | head -30

The one true log. Graph of every branch (local + remote), one line per commit, colored refs. Pipe through head because most of the time you only care about the last 20-30 commits. I have this bound to muscle memory more thoroughly than my own phone number.

gd / gds

git diff / git diff --staged

gd          # what's changed but not staged
gds         # what's staged and about to be committed

gds before every commit. If you set delta as your pager (brew install git-delta, then pager = delta in ~/.gitconfig), the output stops being painful to read.

gcam

git commit -a -m

gcam "fix: trailing slash in webhook URL"

Quick one-line commits for small fixes. For anything bigger I drop the -m and let $EDITOR open so I can write a proper message with a body.

gpsup

git push --set-upstream origin <current-branch>

gpsup

First push of a new branch. The full command is annoying to type, so gpsup figures out the current branch name itself. After the first push, plain gp (just git push) works because upstream is set.

gco / gcb

git checkout / git checkout -b

gco main             # switch to main
gco -                # switch to previous branch
gcb feature/login    # create + switch to new branch

gco - is the one to notice. Like cd - for branches. When you're bouncing between two branches all day, it's a single keystroke each way instead of typing the name.

gpf

git push --force-with-lease

gpf

After rebasing or amending. Always use --force-with-lease, never --force. The lease version refuses to push if someone else has pushed to your branch since your last fetch, saving you from silently overwriting a teammate's work. There is no good reason to ever type --force in 2026.

gfa

git fetch --all --prune

gfa

Refresh every remote, prune deleted remote branches. Run before you start anything that depends on knowing the current state of the world. The --prune half is what makes the next section work.

the weekly five

The commands that aren't in your fingers yet but should be.

git switch and git restore (the new commands)

git switch main
git switch -c new-feature           # create + switch
git restore --staged file.txt       # unstage
git restore --source=abc123 file.go # restore single file from any commit

switch and restore split the four jobs checkout used to do. Safer because they can't accidentally do the wrong one. The one I reach for most is restore --source=<sha> <path>. Translation: "grab this single file from three commits ago without touching anything else."

interactive rebase with autosquash

git commit --fixup=abc123       # fixup commit targeting abc123
git commit --fixup=abc123       # another one, still targeting
# ... keep working ...
git rebase -i --autosquash main # all fixups slot into place automatically

This is the single biggest workflow win I've found in ten years of git. While reviewing your own PR you find a bug four commits back. Don't fix it on top. git commit --fixup=<sha> creates a commit targeting the offender. Keep working. When you're done: git rebase -i --autosquash main reorders and squashes everything for you. PR history stays clean. No // fix bug in earlier commit commits.

Install git-absorb (brew install git-absorb) and it picks the target sha for you by looking at which lines you changed. The flow becomes:

# edit files to fix the bugs
git absorb --and-rebase
# done.

The first time it works on a six-commit branch you'll wonder why it isn't built into git.

git reflog, the universal undo

git reflog
git reset --hard HEAD@{5}

Every change to HEAD is logged for 90 days. Bad rebase? reflog. Deleted branch? reflog. reset --hard to the wrong commit? reflog. There is almost nothing in git you can't undo if you know about it. I've never met anyone who used it as much as they should.

git worktree

git worktree add ../proj-hotfix hotfix/prod-down
git worktree list
git worktree remove ../proj-hotfix

Need to fix a prod bug while halfway through a feature? Don't stash. worktree add gives you a second checkout in a sibling directory, sharing the same .git. Same repo, two working trees, both editable, no stash gymnastics. I use it constantly for "let me review your PR" without leaving my own branch.

branches sorted by recency

git config --global alias.recent \
  "for-each-ref --sort=-committerdate refs/heads/ \
   --format='%(HEAD) %(color:yellow)%(refname:short)%(color:reset) \
             %(color:green)(%(committerdate:relative))%(color:reset) %(contents:subject)'"

git recent | head -10

git branch lists alphabetically, which is useless. git recent lists by last-commit-date, which is exactly what you want when you're trying to remember the name of "that branch from Tuesday."

the cleanup ritual

Run this weekly. If you've ever scrolled through 80 stale branches looking for the one you actually want, you already know why.

the easy half: real merges

gfa
git branch --merged main | grep -v '\*\|main\|master' | xargs -n1 git branch -d

Deletes every local branch whose tip commit is already in main. Works only if your team uses merge commits. Most don't.

the hard half: squash-merges

GitHub's "Squash and merge" creates a brand-new commit on main with a different SHA. git branch --merged won't catch your local branch because its commits literally aren't in main's history.

The workaround: after gfa, any branch whose tracked remote was deleted shows as [gone]. Those are your merged-and-deleted PRs.

# git-gone: delete local branches whose remote tracking branch is gone
git-gone() {
  git fetch --prune
  local gone
  gone=$(git for-each-ref --format '%(refname:short) %(upstream:track)' refs/heads \
         | awk '$2 == "[gone]" {print $1}')
  if [ -z "$gone" ]; then
    echo "No gone branches"
    return
  fi
  echo "$gone"
  echo -n "Delete these? [y/N] "
  read -r confirm
  [[ "$confirm" == "y" ]] && echo "$gone" | xargs -r git branch -D
}

Or install git-trim (brew install git-trim), which is smarter. It also detects patch-equivalent commits, so it catches squash-merges even when the upstream tracking ref isn't [gone].

git trim                # dry-run
git trim --confirm      # actually delete

This is the closest thing to "did my PR ship?" you can ask git directly.

the archeology pack

For when something is broken and the question is "when did this start."

pickaxe, finding when a string appeared

git log -S "functionName"       # commits where this string was added or removed
git log -G "regex"              # same but with regex

git log --grep searches commit messages. -S searches the content of the diff. Different thing entirely. When you need to find "who introduced this line" but the answer isn't simple blame because the line has moved, pickaxe is the answer.

git blame -w -C -C -C

git blame -w -C -C -C path/to/file.go

Plain blame is misleading. It gives credit to whoever last touched the line, which is often whoever ran a formatter. The flags:

• -w ignore whitespace changes
• -C -C -C follow code copied or moved across files, with three levels of aggressiveness

The result: the actual author of the logic, not the person who reformatted it. I've used these flags to chase down a bug that touched code that had moved across three files in two refactors. Plain blame would have pointed at a Prettier commit.

git log -p --follow <file>

git log -p --follow path/to/renamed-file.go

Full history of a single file, including across renames. Default git log loses the trail at the rename boundary. --follow does not.

git range-diff

git range-diff main feature-old feature-new
git range-diff @{u} @

After rewriting history with rebase, this shows what actually changed between two ranges of commits, not just file diffs. The @{u}..@ form compares your local branch to its upstream. Run it before every force-push and you'll see exactly what you're about to overwrite. The last reviewer I worked with on a big rebase asked me to paste the range-diff into the PR comments instead of re-reviewing the whole thing.

the "stop pasting from Stack Overflow" pack

Enable these once and forget about them.

turn on rerere

git config --global rerere.enabled true

That's it. Git now remembers how you resolved a conflict and replays the resolution automatically the next time the same conflict appears. Saves real time on long-running rebases.

default to safer push

git config --global push.default current
git config --global push.autoSetupRemote true

current makes git push push the current branch to a remote of the same name. autoSetupRemote means git push on a new branch sets upstream automatically. No more gpsup for the first push.

better diff and merge UX

git config --global diff.algorithm histogram
git config --global merge.conflictStyle zdiff3

histogram produces cleaner diffs for most refactors than the default myers. zdiff3 shows the common ancestor in conflict markers, i.e. the original code both sides diverged from. Once you've used it, plain <<<<<<< markers feel like flying blind.

maintenance, on a schedule

git maintenance start

Sets up a background cron-equivalent that runs gc, prefetch, and loose-objects on a schedule. Repos stay fast without manual git gc runs.

the three tools worth installing today

• git-absorb (brew install git-absorb). Auto-fixup commits without picking SHAs.
• delta (brew install git-delta). Diff and blame output that doesn't hurt to look at.
• lazygit (brew install lazygit). TUI for the operations that are tedious on CLI: partial commits, interactive add, stash management, conflict resolution.

I don't reach for lazygit daily, but the day I do, usually a five-way merge conflict, it pays for itself immediately.

bonus: two AI shell helpers for the stuff git can't tell you

Git can tell you what changed. It can't tell you the syntax for the find command you needed two minutes ago. Two short zsh functions wrap an AI CLI so the answer lands in the terminal instead of in a chat tab. p prints to stdout (for reading), d pre-types a command into your next prompt (for running).

# p: one-shot AI answer printed to terminal (math, facts, regex, syntax)
p() {
  emulate -L zsh
  setopt NO_GLOB
  if [ $# -eq 0 ]; then
    echo "usage: p <question or task>" >&2
    return 1
  fi
  pi -p --no-session --append-system-prompt 'Answer in ONE line. No preamble, no explanation, no markdown, no code fences. For shell/kubectl/git/etc requests output only the command. For factual or math questions output only the answer.' "$*" \
    | tr -d '\000-\037' \
    | sed 's/^[[:space:]]*//;s/[[:space:]]*$//'
}
alias p='noglob p'

# d: AI suggests a shell command, pre-typed into next prompt (review + Enter)
d() {
  emulate -L zsh
  setopt NO_GLOB
  local query="$*"
  local prompt="You are a command line expert. The user wants to run a command but they don't know how. Here is what they asked: ${query}. Return ONLY the exact shell command needed. No explanation, no markdown, no code blocks. Just the raw command."
  local cmd
  cmd=$(droid exec -m glm-4.6 -r off --output-format text --disabled-tools execute-cli -- "$prompt" \
        | tr -d '\000-\037' \
        | sed 's/^[[:space:]]*//;s/[[:space:]]*$//')
  print -z -- "$cmd"
}
alias d='noglob d'

Swap pi and droid for whatever AI CLI you have: claude -p, llm, gh copilot suggest, ollama run. The pattern is what matters, not the backend.

why split into two functions

Different jobs:

the trick: print -z is what makes d safe

print -z pushes text onto the zsh line editor, i.e. into your next prompt, pre-typed and ready. Compared to the alternatives:

Same trick Ctrl-R history search uses. Native zsh. You always see and approve the command before it runs.

what it feels like

$ p git rebase abort
git rebase --abort

$ p whats the syntax for git log since a date
git log --since="2 weeks ago"

$ d find all .log files modified in the last hour
# next prompt now shows, cursor at the end:
$ find . -type f -name "*.log" -mmin -60█

$ d remove all local branches whose remote is gone
# next prompt:
$ git fetch --prune && git for-each-ref --format '%(refname:short) %(upstream:track)' refs/heads | awk '$2 == "[gone]" {print $1}' | xargs git branch -D█

A two-letter command, and the answer is already on the line where you wanted it.

the three defensive details

emulate -L zsh; setopt NO_GLOB         # function-local zsh defaults, no globbing
alias p='noglob p'                      # `p list *.log files` won't glob-expand `*.log`
tr -d '\000-\037' | sed 's/[trim]//'    # strip control chars (incl. ANSI), trim whitespace

noglob is the one most people miss. Without it, d list all *.log files would have zsh expand *.log against the current directory before the function ever sees it. With noglob, the glob characters pass through literally.

A single-function variant of this, with a heuristic that picks stdout vs pre-typed automatically, lives in this TIL.

ten years in, the surprise

After a decade, the command I run most isn't commit. It isn't push. It's gst, hundreds of times a day, between every other operation. The most-used git command in my shell is the one that does nothing.