GIT-REFLOG(1) Git Manual GIT-REFLOG(1)
NAME
git-reflog - Manage reflog information
SYNOPSIS
git reflog [show] [<log-options>] [<ref>]
git reflog list
git reflog expire [--expire=<time>] [--expire-unreachable=<time>]
[--rewrite] [--updateref] [--stale-fix]
[--dry-run | -n] [--verbose] [--all [--single-worktree] | <refs>...]
git reflog delete [--rewrite] [--updateref]
[--dry-run | -n] [--verbose] <ref>@{<specifier>}...
git reflog exists <ref>
DESCRIPTION
This command manages the information recorded in the reflogs.
Reference logs, or "reflogs", record when the tips of branches and other
references were updated in the local repository. Reflogs are useful in
various Git commands, to specify the old value of a reference. For
example, HEAD@{2} means "where HEAD used to be two moves ago",
master@{one.week.ago} means "where master used to point to one week ago
in this local repository", and so on. See gitrevisions(7) for more
details.
The command takes various subcommands, and different options depending
on the subcommand:
The "show" subcommand (which is also the default, in the absence of any
subcommands) shows the log of the reference provided in the command-line
(or HEAD, by default). The reflog covers all recent actions, and in
addition the HEAD reflog records branch switching. git reflog show is an
alias for git log -g --abbrev-commit --pretty=oneline; see git-log(1)
for more information.
The "list" subcommand lists all refs which have a corresponding reflog.
The "expire" subcommand prunes older reflog entries. Entries older than
expire time, or entries older than expire-unreachable time and not
reachable from the current tip, are removed from the reflog. This is
typically not used directly by end users — instead, see git-gc(1).
The "delete" subcommand deletes single entries from the reflog. Its
argument must be an exact entry (e.g. "git reflog delete master@{2}").
This subcommand is also typically not used directly by end users.
The "exists" subcommand checks whether a ref has a reflog. It exits with
zero status if the reflog exists, and non-zero status if it does not.
OPTIONS
Options for show
git reflog show accepts any of the options accepted by git log.
Options for expire
--all
Process the reflogs of all references.
--single-worktree
By default when --all is specified, reflogs from all working trees
are processed. This option limits the processing to reflogs from the
current working tree only.
--expire=<time>
Prune entries older than the specified time. If this option is not
specified, the expiration time is taken from the configuration
setting gc.reflogExpire, which in turn defaults to 90 days.
--expire=all prunes entries regardless of their age; --expire=never
turns off pruning of reachable entries (but see
--expire-unreachable).
--expire-unreachable=<time>
Prune entries older than <time> that are not reachable from the
current tip of the branch. If this option is not specified, the
expiration time is taken from the configuration setting
gc.reflogExpireUnreachable, which in turn defaults to 30 days.
--expire-unreachable=all prunes unreachable entries regardless of
their age; --expire-unreachable=never turns off early pruning of
unreachable entries (but see --expire).
--updateref
Update the reference to the value of the top reflog entry (i.e.
<ref>@{0}) if the previous top entry was pruned. (This option is
ignored for symbolic references.)
--rewrite
If a reflog entry’s predecessor is pruned, adjust its "old" SHA-1 to
be equal to the "new" SHA-1 field of the entry that now precedes it.
--stale-fix
Prune any reflog entries that point to "broken commits". A broken
commit is a commit that is not reachable from any of the reference
tips and that refers, directly or indirectly, to a missing commit,
tree, or blob object.
This computation involves traversing all the reachable objects, i.e.
it has the same cost as git prune. It is primarily intended to fix
corruption caused by garbage collecting using older versions of Git,
which didn’t protect objects referred to by reflogs.
-n, --dry-run
Do not actually prune any entries; just show what would have been
pruned.
--verbose
Print extra information on screen.
Options for delete
git reflog delete accepts options --updateref, --rewrite, -n, --dry-run,
and --verbose, with the same meanings as when they are used with expire.
GIT
Part of the git(1) suite
Git 2.47.3 07/30/2025 GIT-REFLOG(1)
Generated by dwww version 1.16 on Tue Dec 16 04:32:35 CET 2025.