Discard changes to file – Git

Summary

To discard changes to a file, enter the following command in your terminal:

git checkout -- file-name

Details

The above command only works when you’ve modified a file but haven’t staged it yet.

As an example, if you wanted to discard the changes you’ve made to the home page of your website (index.html), you could use the following command:

git checkout -- index.html

Tip: Git will remind you about this command when you use git status and the file hasn’t been staged yet. You should see the following message print out when you use git status:

Changes not staged for commit:
  (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
  (use "git checkout -- <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)

Exercises

Write some code in index.html. Then use the following command to discard the changes.

git checkout -- index.html

References

Undoing Things from the Pro Git book

Back to: Git Reference > Git Undoing Things