This depends a lot on what you mean by "revert".

Temporarily switch to a different commit

If you want to temporarily go back to it, fool around, then come back to where you are, all you have to do is check out the desired commit:

# This will detach your HEAD, that is, leave you with no branch checked out:
git checkout 0d1d7fc32

Or if you want to make commits while you're there, go ahead and make a new branch while you're at it:

git checkout -b old-state 0d1d7fc32

To go back to where you were, just check out the branch you were on again. (If you've made changes, as always when switching branches, you'll have to deal with them as appropriate. You could reset to throw them away; you could stash, checkout, stash pop to take them with you; you could commit them to a branch there if you want a branch there.)

Hard delete unpublished commits

If, on the other hand, you want to really get rid of everything you've done since then, there are two possibilities. One, if you haven't published any of these commits, simply reset:

# This will destroy any local modifications.
# Don't do it if you have uncommitted work you want to keep.
git reset --hard 0d1d7fc32

# Alternatively, if there's work to keep:
git stash
git reset --hard 0d1d7fc32
git stash pop
# This saves the modifications, then reapplies that patch after resetting.
# You could get merge conflicts, if you've modified things which were
# changed since the commit you reset to.

If you mess up, you've already thrown away your local changes, but you can at least get back to where you were before by resetting again.

Undo published commits with new commits

On the other hand, if you've published the work, you probably don't want to reset the branch, since that's effectively rewriting history. In that case, you could indeed revert the commits. In many enterprise organisations, the concept of "protected" branches will even prevent history from being rewritten on some major branches. In this case, reverting is your only option.

With Git, revert has a very specific meaning: create a commit with the reverse patch to cancel it out. This way you don't rewrite any history.

First figure out what commits to revert. Depending on the technique chosen below, you want to either revert only the merge commits, or only the non-merge commits.

# This lists all merge commits between 0d1d7fc and HEAD:
git log --merges --pretty=format:"%h" 0d1d7fc..HEAD | tr '\n' ' '

# This lists all non merge commits between 0d1d7fc and HEAD:
git log --no-merges --pretty=format:"%h" 0d1d7fc..HEAD | tr '\n' ' '

Note: if you revert multiple commits, the order matters. Start with the most recent commit.

# This will create three separate revert commits, use non merge commits only:
git revert a867b4af 25eee4ca 0766c053

# It also takes ranges. This will revert the last two commits:
git revert HEAD~2..HEAD

# Similarly, you can revert a range of commits using commit hashes (non inclusive of first hash):
git revert 0d1d7fc..a867b4a

# Reverting a merge commit. You can also use a range of merge commits here.
git revert -m 1 <merge_commit_sha>

# To get just one, you could use `rebase -i` to squash them afterwards
# Or, you could do it manually (be sure to do this at top level of the repo)
# get your index and work tree into the desired state, without changing HEAD:
git checkout 0d1d7fc32 .

# Then commit. Be sure and write a good message describing what you just did
git commit

The git-revert manpage actually covers a lot of this in its description. Another useful link is this git-scm.com section discussing git-revert.

If you decide you didn't want to revert after all, you can revert the revert (as described here) or reset back to before the revert (see the previous section).

You may also find this answer helpful in this case:
How can I move HEAD back to a previous location? (Detached head) & Undo commits

Answer from Cascabel on Stack Overflow
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Git Tower
git-tower.com › learn › git faq › how to undo, revert, or delete a git commit
How to Undo, Revert, or Delete a Git Commit | Learn Version Control with Git
What if you want to undo the effects of a commit that's not the most recent one — without touching any commits that came after it? That's what git revert is for. Unlike reset, git revert doesn't delete any commits. It creates a new commit ...
Published   1 day ago
Top answer
1 of 16
12602

This depends a lot on what you mean by "revert".

Temporarily switch to a different commit

If you want to temporarily go back to it, fool around, then come back to where you are, all you have to do is check out the desired commit:

# This will detach your HEAD, that is, leave you with no branch checked out:
git checkout 0d1d7fc32

Or if you want to make commits while you're there, go ahead and make a new branch while you're at it:

git checkout -b old-state 0d1d7fc32

To go back to where you were, just check out the branch you were on again. (If you've made changes, as always when switching branches, you'll have to deal with them as appropriate. You could reset to throw them away; you could stash, checkout, stash pop to take them with you; you could commit them to a branch there if you want a branch there.)

Hard delete unpublished commits

If, on the other hand, you want to really get rid of everything you've done since then, there are two possibilities. One, if you haven't published any of these commits, simply reset:

# This will destroy any local modifications.
# Don't do it if you have uncommitted work you want to keep.
git reset --hard 0d1d7fc32

# Alternatively, if there's work to keep:
git stash
git reset --hard 0d1d7fc32
git stash pop
# This saves the modifications, then reapplies that patch after resetting.
# You could get merge conflicts, if you've modified things which were
# changed since the commit you reset to.

If you mess up, you've already thrown away your local changes, but you can at least get back to where you were before by resetting again.

Undo published commits with new commits

On the other hand, if you've published the work, you probably don't want to reset the branch, since that's effectively rewriting history. In that case, you could indeed revert the commits. In many enterprise organisations, the concept of "protected" branches will even prevent history from being rewritten on some major branches. In this case, reverting is your only option.

With Git, revert has a very specific meaning: create a commit with the reverse patch to cancel it out. This way you don't rewrite any history.

First figure out what commits to revert. Depending on the technique chosen below, you want to either revert only the merge commits, or only the non-merge commits.

# This lists all merge commits between 0d1d7fc and HEAD:
git log --merges --pretty=format:"%h" 0d1d7fc..HEAD | tr '\n' ' '

# This lists all non merge commits between 0d1d7fc and HEAD:
git log --no-merges --pretty=format:"%h" 0d1d7fc..HEAD | tr '\n' ' '

Note: if you revert multiple commits, the order matters. Start with the most recent commit.

# This will create three separate revert commits, use non merge commits only:
git revert a867b4af 25eee4ca 0766c053

# It also takes ranges. This will revert the last two commits:
git revert HEAD~2..HEAD

# Similarly, you can revert a range of commits using commit hashes (non inclusive of first hash):
git revert 0d1d7fc..a867b4a

# Reverting a merge commit. You can also use a range of merge commits here.
git revert -m 1 <merge_commit_sha>

# To get just one, you could use `rebase -i` to squash them afterwards
# Or, you could do it manually (be sure to do this at top level of the repo)
# get your index and work tree into the desired state, without changing HEAD:
git checkout 0d1d7fc32 .

# Then commit. Be sure and write a good message describing what you just did
git commit

The git-revert manpage actually covers a lot of this in its description. Another useful link is this git-scm.com section discussing git-revert.

If you decide you didn't want to revert after all, you can revert the revert (as described here) or reset back to before the revert (see the previous section).

You may also find this answer helpful in this case:
How can I move HEAD back to a previous location? (Detached head) & Undo commits

2 of 16
3981

Lots of complicated and dangerous answers here, but it's actually easy:

git revert --no-commit 0d1d7fc3..HEAD
git commit
git push

This will revert everything from the HEAD back to the commit hash (excluded), meaning it will recreate that commit state in the working tree as if every commit after 0d1d7fc3 had been walked back. You can then commit the current tree, and it will create a brand new commit essentially equivalent to the commit you "reverted" to.

(The --no-commit flag lets git revert all the commits at once- otherwise you'll be prompted for a message for each commit in the range, littering your history with unnecessary new commits.)

This is a safe and easy way to rollback to a previous state. No history is destroyed, so it can be used for commits that have already been made public.


Note on merge commits:
If one of the commits between 0766c053..HEAD (inclusive) is a merge then there will be an error popping up (to do with no -m specified). The following link may help those encountering that: Why does git revert complain about a missing -m option? (thanks @timhc22 for pointing out)

People also ask

How to Undo, Revert, or Delete a Git Commit
To undo the last local commit (one that hasn't been pushed yet) while keeping your changes staged, run git reset --soft HEAD~1. To unstage the changes but keep the edits in your working directory, use git reset --mixed HEAD~1. To discard the changes entirely, use git reset --hard HEAD~1 — this permanently deletes the uncommitted work. To undo a specific older commit without altering history, use git revert , which creates a new commit that applies the reverse of the targeted commit's changes; this is the safest approach for shared branches. The --no-commit flag stages the reverting changes wit
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git-tower.com
git-tower.com › learn › git faq › how to undo, revert, or delete a git commit
How to Undo, Revert, or Delete a Git Commit | Learn Version Control ...
What is the main difference between git reset and git revert when undoing commits?
git reset rewinds history and discards everything that came after the target commit, essentially removing later commits from history. In contrast, git revert creates a new commit that cancels the changes from a specific commit while leaving all other commits intact, preserving the complete history of your project.
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wikitwist.com
wikitwist.com › home › how to revert a single git commit (without losing later changes)
How to Revert a Single Git Commit (Without Losing Later Changes) ...
How can I revert changes from a commit in just one specific file rather than the entire commit?
Use git restore --source=^ -- path/to/file to restore that specific file to its state before the problematic commit. After running this command, you need to stage the file with git add path/to/file and then commit the change manually with a descriptive message like 'Revert changes from commit abc1234 in path/to/file'.
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wikitwist.com
wikitwist.com › home › how to revert a single git commit (without losing later changes)
How to Revert a Single Git Commit (Without Losing Later Changes) ...
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Atlassian
atlassian.com › git › tutorials › undoing changes › git revert
How to Revert a Commit in Git? | Atlassian Git Tutorial
The git revert command can be considered an 'undo' type command, however, it is not a traditional undo operation. Instead of removing the commit from the project history, it figures out how to invert the changes introduced by the commit and appends a new commit with the resulting inverse content...
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LabEx
labex.io › tutorials › git-how-to-revert-a-git-commit-without-losing-changes-415168
How to revert a Git commit without losing changes | LabEx
First, copy the commit hash of the commit you want to revert. From the output in the previous step, this is the commit with the message "Add a second, unwanted line". Now, run the git revert command with that hash.
🌐
freeCodeCamp
freecodecamp.org › news › git-reverting-to-previous-commit-how-to-revert-to-last-commit
Git Reverting to Previous Commit – How to Revert to Last Commit
October 19, 2022 - To do that, run the command below: ... As you can see above, this command lists all your commits along with their IDs. To go back to the second commit, you run the git reset command followed by the commit ID.
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Reddit
reddit.com › r/git › how do i revert to a previous commit without changes for this scenario ?
r/git on Reddit: how do I revert to a previous commit without changes for this scenario ?
August 4, 2022 -

Hi guys,

I am stuck in another tricky situation.

When I discovered I have done certain commits that are wrong, then I did :

git reset --hard commitNo1

I went on to do the changes that I need to only to discover that the code is already mixed with some code-generation stuff. No choice, I then wanted to revert to a earlier version :

I did

git revert --no-commit commitEarlierNo..HEAD

following this suggestion :

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4114095/how-do-i-revert-a-git-repository-to-a-previous-commit

and now I got this below message:

error: Your local changes to the following files would be overwritten by merge:

Please commit your changes or stash them before you merge
Aborting
fatal: revert failed

Please help me now what can i do by aborting all the changes and I just want to revert to that even earlier version, and I am ok to discard changes I have made so far after I did that reset Hard to that commitNo1

Find elsewhere
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WikiTwist
wikitwist.com › home › how to revert a single git commit (without losing later changes)
How to Revert a Single Git Commit (Without Losing Later Changes) - WikiTwist
November 9, 2025 - If you don’t want to undo the entire commit but only the changes it introduced in a single file, you can do a partial revert: ... This command restores that file to its state before the commit. Stage and commit it manually to finalize: git add path/to/file git commit -m "Revert changes from commit abc1234 in path/to/file"
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CloudBees
cloudbees.com › blog › git-revert-explained
Git Revert Explained: Safely Undoing Your Changes
November 29, 2021 - Git revert undoes changes in a project commit history without tampering with it. When reverting, this operation takes the specific commit, inverts the changes from that commit, and implements a new reverse commit—only removing the changes ...
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GitKraken
gitkraken.com › home › learn › problems & solutions › how to revert a git commit
Git Revert Commit | Solutions to Git Problems
February 5, 2024 - If you need to make revisions to a commit that is not your last commit, the best solution is to create a new commit by reverting the old commit. As a Git best practice, you should avoid doing anything that will require you to force push — ...
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Stack Abuse
stackabuse.com › git-revert-to-a-previous-commit
Git: Revert to a Previous Commit
February 16, 2023 - To avoid losing any working changes, you can use the stash and stash pop commands: $ git stash $ git reset --hard <hash-or-ref> $ git stash pop · The stash command saves your working changes (without any commits or changes to the tree), and then stash pop brings them back.
Top answer
1 of 5
36

If you're sure that neither soft reset nor creating multiple branches work for your use case, you could do

git diff HEAD commit_hash_to_go_to | git apply

This will create a diff of changes between the latest commit on your branch and the commit with the desired state and automatically apply it. That will simply change the files, it's your job to add them to staging and commit the result. Might be useful if you want to try out different solutions and keep the history of your changes WITHIN the same branch or avoid multiplying local branches.

If you encounter "cannot apply binary patch to without full index line" error, add --binary flag:

git diff HEAD commit_hash_to_go_to --binary | git apply

Before doing this ensure that you've got no uncommitted changes - otherwise the patch won't be applied (it's atomic so either all changes go through or none, so you won't end up in an inconsistent state)

NOTE: this simply changes the files and marks them as modified. It does NOT alter commit history or create new commits

HINT: If you just want undo the last commit, you can do

git diff HEAD HEAD~1 | git apply

The "~1" is how much commits you want to go back. In this case only 1 commit back.

2 of 5
14

The easiest thing to do, like you say, would be to simply create a new branch where HEAD is and then revert development to the commit you want to resume work from:

git checkout development   # Make HEAD point to the 'development' branch
git branch beforeRevert    # Create a new branch reference pointing to HEAD
git reset --hard c14809fa  # Move HEAD, the index and your working copy to c14809fa

Here's a graphical representation of what will happen:

    Step 1               Step 2                  Step 3

            develop    develop, beforeRevert   develop   beforeRevert
           /                    /             /         /
A-B-C-D-E-F          A-B-C-D-E-F             A-B-C-D-E-F
          ^                    ^             ^
         HEAD                 HEAD          HEAD

The important thing here is that HEAD is always pointing to the development branch, so that's the branch that gets moved when you run git reset --hard c14809fa. The new beforeRevert branch will still point to where HEAD was before the revert.

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Medium
jeevabyte.medium.com › how-to-revert-to-a-previous-commit-in-git-and-make-it-the-latest-one-6ac766ff78f4
How to Revert to a Previous Commit in Git and Make It the Latest One | by Jeeva-AWSLabsJourney | Medium
March 9, 2025 - This will reset your branch to that specific commit, deleting all subsequent changes permanently. If your repository is remote (GitHub, GitLab, etc.), you’ll need to force push the changes:
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DEV Community
dev.to › edriso › how-to-undo-a-git-commit-without-losing-history-3ifp
How to Undo a Git Commit Without Losing History - DEV Community
April 23, 2026 - # See your commits git log --oneline # Revert the one you don't want git revert <commit-hash> --no-edit · Simple, safe, and no drama. That's the Git way.
Top answer
1 of 9
1774

There are a lot of ways to do so, for example:

in case you have not pushed the commit publicly yet:

git reset HEAD~1 --soft   

That's it, your commit changes will be in your working directory, whereas the LAST commit will be removed from your current branch. See git reset man


In case you did push publicly (on a branch called 'master'):

git checkout -b MyCommit //save your commit in a separate branch just in case (so you don't have to dig it from reflog in case you screw up :) )

revert commit normally and push

git checkout master
git revert a8172f36 #hash of the commit you want to destroy
# this introduces a new commit (say, it's hash is 86b48ba) which removes changes, introduced in the commit in question (but those changes are still visible in the history)
git push origin master

now if you want to have those changes as you local changes in your working copy ("so that your local copy keeps the changes made in that commit") - just revert the revert commit with --no-commit option:

git revert --no-commit 86b48ba (hash of the revert commit).

I've crafted a small example: https://github.com/Isantipov/git-revert/commits/master

2 of 9
56

The easiest way to undo the last Git commit is to execute the git reset command with one of the below options

  • soft
  • hard
  • mixed

Let's assume you have added two commits and you want to undo the last commit

$ git log --oneline

45e6e13 (HEAD -> master) Second commit
eb14168 Initial commit

–soft option undo the last commit and preserve changes done to your files

$ git reset --soft HEAD~1


$ git status

On branch master
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git restore --staged <file>..." to unstage)
    modified:   file.html


$ git log --oneline

eb14168 (HEAD -> master) Initial commit

–hard option undo the last commit and discard all changes in the working directory and index

$ git reset --hard HEAD~1


$ git status

nothing to commit, working tree clean


$ git log --oneline

eb14168 (HEAD -> master) Initial commit

--mixed option undo the last commit and keep changes in the working directory but NOT in the index

$ git reset --mixed HEAD~1


$ git status

On branch master
Changes not staged for commit:
  (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
  (use "git restore <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)
    modified:   file.html

no changes added to commit (use "git add" and/or "git commit -a")


$ git log --oneline

eb14168 (HEAD -> master) Initial commit
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GitLab
docs.gitlab.com › topics › git › undo
Revert and undo changes | GitLab Docs
If a file was changed in a commit, and you want to change it back to how it was in the previous commit, but keep the commit history, you can use git revert.
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Reddit
reddit.com › r/git › i'm struggling to understand how to roll back to a previous point. i want to disregard the crossed out chain completely. what am i missing here?
r/git on Reddit: I'm struggling to understand how to roll back to a previous point. I want to disregard the crossed out chain completely. What am I missing here?
December 11, 2024 - If you absolutely want to roll-back your branch to a previous commit, forgetting all newer commits: git reset --hard <oldcommitID> ... This is great feedback, thank you! Very fair, I was just kinda clicking buttons in the GUI just hoping I hit ...
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Graphite
graphite.com › guides › git-revert-commit-after-pushing
git revert commit after pushing - Graphite
git revert creates a new commit that undoes the changes from a previous commit, preserving the commit history. git reset moves the branch pointer to a previous commit, effectively removing commits from the history.
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Reddit
reddit.com › r/git › i want to revert the code to a previous commit.
r/git on Reddit: I want to revert the code to a previous commit.
November 8, 2022 -

I did some feature changes in my code but now I want it to be like the same code which was 16 commits ago. All my changes are pushed to GitHub and I do not want to lose my history or change my branch. How do I do this in the most minimum steps?

🌐
Sentry
sentry.io › sentry answers › git › revert a git repository to a previous commit
Revert a Git repository to a previous commit | Sentry
You can use the git revert command to return your repository’s files to a previous state without rewriting the commit history. This is done by creating new commits that do the opposite of existing commits, i.e.