Are you looking for a way to remove the last N number of commits from your Git repository? If yes then you’ve come to the right place! In this blog post, I’ll show you how you can easily remove commits in Git using the following two commands:
- git revert and
- git reset
First, let’s discuss the difference between the two commands.
Difference between git revert and git reset
git revert
The “git revert” command allows us to undo the changes made in a specific commit, creating a new commit that reverses the changes. This means that the commit will still be present in the commit history, but the changes made in it will be undone.
git reset
The “git reset” command allows us to discard commits, moving the branch pointer to a previous commit and destroying the commits in the process. This means that the specified commits will be permanently deleted from the repository.
Now that we’ve covered the differences between the two commands, let’s dive into how to use them to remove commits from your repository.
Disclaimer
It is always suggested to use these commands with caution to avoid affecting the commit history of your repository.
Remove commits using git revert
To remove the last N commits using the “git revert” command, you can use the following command:
git revert HEAD~[N]
Replace “[N]” with the number of commits you want to remove, starting from the last commit. For example, to remove the last two commits, you would use “git revert HEAD~2”. This command will create a new commit that undoes the changes made in the specified commit.
Remove commits using git reset
To delete the last N commits using the “git reset” command, you can use the following command:
git reset HEAD~[N]
Replace “[N]” with the number of commits you want to remove, starting from the last commit. For example, to remove the last two commits, you would use “git reset HEAD~2”. This command will delete the specified commits and permanently remove them from the commit history.
Example:
git reset --hard HEAD~2In the above command, 2 is the number of the last commits you want to remove. You can increase or decrease this value as per your need.
Replace “[N]” with the number of commits you want to remove, starting from the last commit. For example, to remove the last two commits, you would use “git reset HEAD~2”. This command will delete the specified commits and permanently remove them from the commit history.
It is important to note that both the “git revert” and “git reset” commands should be used with caution, as they can affect the commit history of your repository. If you have already pushed the commits to a remote repository, you will need to use the “git push” command with the “–force” option to overwrite the remote repository with the new commit history.
Note
While pushing to remote branch if you get any error you can use-falong with the push command. Eg:git push -f originbranch_name
If you want to do the same for multiple branches then you can do it manually for other branches as well.
Conclusion
In this blog post, we learn that the commands “git revert” and “git reset” are powerful tools for removing commits from a Git repository. We also learn to use the “git revert” command to undo the changes made in a specific commit, and the “git reset” command to permanently delete commits from the repository.
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