Check out a remote branch in Git
David Y.
—The Problem
How do I check out a remote branch in Git?
The Solution
The git fetch command is used to download branches from a remote repository. If the repository has a single remote, running git fetch will download all branches. If the repository has multiple remotes, we must specify which remote to download from, e.g. git fetch origin.
Once git fetch has executed, we can get a list of all remote and local branches with the command:
git branch -a
In the output of this command, remote branches will be formatted as remotes-/<remote>/<branch> and local branches as <branch>. For example:
main remotes/origin/new-feature remotes/another-remote/new-feature
Once remote branches have been fetched, we can use git checkout as we would with a local branch:
git checkout new-feature
This will create a new branch in our local repository that tracks the remote branch.
If you’re fetching from multiple remote repositories that have branches with the same name, a more verbose git checkout command will be required:
git checkout -b new-feature origin/new-feature
This version of the command explicitly tells Git to create a new branch (-b) named new-feature that tracks the remote branch origin/new-feature.
- Syntax.fmListen to the Syntax Podcast
- ResourcesWhat is Distributed Tracing
- Listen to the Syntax Podcast
![Syntax.fm logo]()
Tasty treats for web developers brought to you by Sentry. Get tips and tricks from Wes Bos and Scott Tolinski.
SEE EPISODES
Considered “not bad” by 4 million developers and more than 100,000 organizations worldwide, Sentry provides code-level observability to many of the world’s best-known companies like Disney, Peloton, Cloudflare, Eventbrite, Slack, Supercell, and Rockstar Games. Each month we process billions of exceptions from the most popular products on the internet.