git-add(1) — Linux manual page

NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | EXAMPLES | INTERACTIVE MODE | EDITING PATCHES | CONFIGURATION | SEE ALSO | GIT | COLOPHON

GIT-ADD(1)                      Git Manual                     GIT-ADD(1)

NAME         top

       git-add - Add file contents to the index

SYNOPSIS         top

       git add [--verbose | -v] [--dry-run | -n] [--force | -f] [--interactive | -i] [--patch | -p]
               [--edit | -e] [--[no-]all | -A | --[no-]ignore-removal | [--update | -u]] [--sparse]
               [--intent-to-add | -N] [--refresh] [--ignore-errors] [--ignore-missing] [--renormalize]
               [--chmod=(+|-)x] [--pathspec-from-file=<file> [--pathspec-file-nul]]
               [--] [<pathspec>...]

DESCRIPTION         top

       This command updates the index using the current content found in
       the working tree, to prepare the content staged for the next
       commit. It typically adds the current content of existing paths as
       a whole, but with some options it can also be used to add content
       with only part of the changes made to the working tree files
       applied, or remove paths that do not exist in the working tree
       anymore.

       The "index" holds a snapshot of the content of the working tree,
       and it is this snapshot that is taken as the contents of the next
       commit. Thus after making any changes to the working tree, and
       before running the commit command, you must use the add command to
       add any new or modified files to the index.

       This command can be performed multiple times before a commit. It
       only adds the content of the specified file(s) at the time the add
       command is run; if you want subsequent changes included in the
       next commit, then you must run git add again to add the new
       content to the index.

       The git status command can be used to obtain a summary of which
       files have changes that are staged for the next commit.

       The git add command will not add ignored files by default. If any
       ignored files were explicitly specified on the command line, git
       add will fail with a list of ignored files. Ignored files reached
       by directory recursion or filename globbing performed by Git
       (quote your globs before the shell) will be silently ignored. The
       git add command can be used to add ignored files with the -f
       (force) option.

       Please see git-commit(1) for alternative ways to add content to a
       commit.

OPTIONS         top

       <pathspec>...
           Files to add content from. Fileglobs (e.g. *.c) can be given
           to add all matching files. Also a leading directory name (e.g.
           dir to add dir/file1 and dir/file2) can be given to update the
           index to match the current state of the directory as a whole
           (e.g. specifying dir will record not just a file dir/file1
           modified in the working tree, a file dir/file2 added to the
           working tree, but also a file dir/file3 removed from the
           working tree). Note that older versions of Git used to ignore
           removed files; use --no-all option if you want to add modified
           or new files but ignore removed ones.

           For more details about the <pathspec> syntax, see the pathspec
           entry in gitglossary(7).

       -n, --dry-run
           Don’t actually add the file(s), just show if they exist and/or
           will be ignored.

       -v, --verbose
           Be verbose.

       -f, --force
           Allow adding otherwise ignored files.

       --sparse
           Allow updating index entries outside of the sparse-checkout
           cone. Normally, git add refuses to update index entries whose
           paths do not fit within the sparse-checkout cone, since those
           files might be removed from the working tree without warning.
           See git-sparse-checkout(1) for more details.

       -i, --interactive
           Add modified contents in the working tree interactively to the
           index. Optional path arguments may be supplied to limit
           operation to a subset of the working tree. See “Interactive
           mode” for details.

       -p, --patch
           Interactively choose hunks of patch between the index and the
           work tree and add them to the index. This gives the user a
           chance to review the difference before adding modified
           contents to the index.

           This effectively runs add --interactive, but bypasses the
           initial command menu and directly jumps to the patch
           subcommand. See “Interactive mode” for details.

       -e, --edit
           Open the diff vs. the index in an editor and let the user edit
           it. After the editor was closed, adjust the hunk headers and
           apply the patch to the index.

           The intent of this option is to pick and choose lines of the
           patch to apply, or even to modify the contents of lines to be
           staged. This can be quicker and more flexible than using the
           interactive hunk selector. However, it is easy to confuse
           oneself and create a patch that does not apply to the index.
           See EDITING PATCHES below.

       -u, --update
           Update the index just where it already has an entry matching
           <pathspec>. This removes as well as modifies index entries to
           match the working tree, but adds no new files.

           If no <pathspec> is given when -u option is used, all tracked
           files in the entire working tree are updated (old versions of
           Git used to limit the update to the current directory and its
           subdirectories).

       -A, --all, --no-ignore-removal
           Update the index not only where the working tree has a file
           matching <pathspec> but also where the index already has an
           entry. This adds, modifies, and removes index entries to match
           the working tree.

           If no <pathspec> is given when -A option is used, all files in
           the entire working tree are updated (old versions of Git used
           to limit the update to the current directory and its
           subdirectories).

       --no-all, --ignore-removal
           Update the index by adding new files that are unknown to the
           index and files modified in the working tree, but ignore files
           that have been removed from the working tree. This option is a
           no-op when no <pathspec> is used.

           This option is primarily to help users who are used to older
           versions of Git, whose git add <pathspec>... was a synonym for
           git add --no-all <pathspec>..., i.e. ignored removed files.

       -N, --intent-to-add
           Record only the fact that the path will be added later. An
           entry for the path is placed in the index with no content.
           This is useful for, among other things, showing the unstaged
           content of such files with git diff and committing them with
           git commit -a.

       --refresh
           Don’t add the file(s), but only refresh their stat()
           information in the index.

       --ignore-errors
           If some files could not be added because of errors indexing
           them, do not abort the operation, but continue adding the
           others. The command shall still exit with non-zero status. The
           configuration variable add.ignoreErrors can be set to true to
           make this the default behaviour.

       --ignore-missing
           This option can only be used together with --dry-run. By using
           this option the user can check if any of the given files would
           be ignored, no matter if they are already present in the work
           tree or not.

       --no-warn-embedded-repo
           By default, git add will warn when adding an embedded
           repository to the index without using git submodule add to
           create an entry in .gitmodules. This option will suppress the
           warning (e.g., if you are manually performing operations on
           submodules).

       --renormalize
           Apply the "clean" process freshly to all tracked files to
           forcibly add them again to the index. This is useful after
           changing core.autocrlf configuration or the text attribute in
           order to correct files added with wrong CRLF/LF line endings.
           This option implies -u. Lone CR characters are untouched, thus
           while a CRLF cleans to LF, a CRCRLF sequence is only partially
           cleaned to CRLF.

       --chmod=(+|-)x
           Override the executable bit of the added files. The executable
           bit is only changed in the index, the files on disk are left
           unchanged.

       --pathspec-from-file=<file>
           Pathspec is passed in <file> instead of commandline args. If
           <file> is exactly - then standard input is used. Pathspec
           elements are separated by LF or CR/LF. Pathspec elements can
           be quoted as explained for the configuration variable
           core.quotePath (see git-config(1)). See also
           --pathspec-file-nul and global --literal-pathspecs.

       --pathspec-file-nul
           Only meaningful with --pathspec-from-file. Pathspec elements
           are separated with NUL character and all other characters are
           taken literally (including newlines and quotes).

       --
           This option can be used to separate command-line options from
           the list of files, (useful when filenames might be mistaken
           for command-line options).

EXAMPLES         top

       •   Adds content from all *.txt files under Documentation
           directory and its subdirectories:

               $ git add Documentation/\*.txt

           Note that the asterisk * is quoted from the shell in this
           example; this lets the command include the files from
           subdirectories of Documentation/ directory.

       •   Considers adding content from all git-*.sh scripts:

               $ git add git-*.sh

           Because this example lets the shell expand the asterisk (i.e.
           you are listing the files explicitly), it does not consider
           subdir/git-foo.sh.

INTERACTIVE MODE         top

       When the command enters the interactive mode, it shows the output
       of the status subcommand, and then goes into its interactive
       command loop.

       The command loop shows the list of subcommands available, and
       gives a prompt "What now> ". In general, when the prompt ends with
       a single >, you can pick only one of the choices given and type
       return, like this:

               *** Commands ***
                 1: status       2: update       3: revert       4: add untracked
                 5: patch        6: diff         7: quit         8: help
               What now> 1

       You also could say s or sta or status above as long as the choice
       is unique.

       The main command loop has 6 subcommands (plus help and quit).

       status
           This shows the change between HEAD and index (i.e. what will
           be committed if you say git commit), and between index and
           working tree files (i.e. what you could stage further before
           git commit using git add) for each path. A sample output looks
           like this:

                             staged     unstaged path
                    1:       binary      nothing foo.png
                    2:     +403/-35        +1/-1 add-interactive.c

           It shows that foo.png has differences from HEAD (but that is
           binary so line count cannot be shown) and there is no
           difference between indexed copy and the working tree version
           (if the working tree version were also different, binary would
           have been shown in place of nothing). The other file,
           add-interactive.c, has 403 lines added and 35 lines deleted if
           you commit what is in the index, but working tree file has
           further modifications (one addition and one deletion).

       update
           This shows the status information and issues an "Update>>"
           prompt. When the prompt ends with double >>, you can make more
           than one selection, concatenated with whitespace or comma.
           Also you can say ranges. E.g. "2-5 7,9" to choose 2,3,4,5,7,9
           from the list. If the second number in a range is omitted, all
           remaining patches are taken. E.g. "7-" to choose 7,8,9 from
           the list. You can say * to choose everything.

           What you chose are then highlighted with *, like this:

                          staged     unstaged path
                 1:       binary      nothing foo.png
               * 2:     +403/-35        +1/-1 add-interactive.c

           To remove selection, prefix the input with - like this:

               Update>> -2

           After making the selection, answer with an empty line to stage
           the contents of working tree files for selected paths in the
           index.

       revert
           This has a very similar UI to update, and the staged
           information for selected paths are reverted to that of the
           HEAD version. Reverting new paths makes them untracked.

       add untracked
           This has a very similar UI to update and revert, and lets you
           add untracked paths to the index.

       patch
           This lets you choose one path out of a status like selection.
           After choosing the path, it presents the diff between the
           index and the working tree file and asks you if you want to
           stage the change of each hunk. You can select one of the
           following options and type return:

               y - stage this hunk
               n - do not stage this hunk
               q - quit; do not stage this hunk or any of the remaining ones
               a - stage this hunk and all later hunks in the file
               d - do not stage this hunk or any of the later hunks in the file
               g - select a hunk to go to
               / - search for a hunk matching the given regex
               j - leave this hunk undecided, see next undecided hunk
               J - leave this hunk undecided, see next hunk
               k - leave this hunk undecided, see previous undecided hunk
               K - leave this hunk undecided, see previous hunk
               s - split the current hunk into smaller hunks
               e - manually edit the current hunk
               p - print the current hunk
               ? - print help

           After deciding the fate for all hunks, if there is any hunk
           that was chosen, the index is updated with the selected hunks.

           You can omit having to type return here, by setting the
           configuration variable interactive.singleKey to true.

       diff
           This lets you review what will be committed (i.e. between HEAD
           and index).

EDITING PATCHES         top

       Invoking git add -e or selecting e from the interactive hunk
       selector will open a patch in your editor; after the editor exits,
       the result is applied to the index. You are free to make arbitrary
       changes to the patch, but note that some changes may have
       confusing results, or even result in a patch that cannot be
       applied. If you want to abort the operation entirely (i.e., stage
       nothing new in the index), simply delete all lines of the patch.
       The list below describes some common things you may see in a
       patch, and which editing operations make sense on them.

       added content
           Added content is represented by lines beginning with "+". You
           can prevent staging any addition lines by deleting them.

       removed content
           Removed content is represented by lines beginning with "-".
           You can prevent staging their removal by converting the "-" to
           a " " (space).

       modified content
           Modified content is represented by "-" lines (removing the old
           content) followed by "+" lines (adding the replacement
           content). You can prevent staging the modification by
           converting "-" lines to " ", and removing "+" lines. Beware
           that modifying only half of the pair is likely to introduce
           confusing changes to the index.

       There are also more complex operations that can be performed. But
       beware that because the patch is applied only to the index and not
       the working tree, the working tree will appear to "undo" the
       change in the index. For example, introducing a new line into the
       index that is in neither the HEAD nor the working tree will stage
       the new line for commit, but the line will appear to be reverted
       in the working tree.

       Avoid using these constructs, or do so with extreme caution.

       removing untouched content
           Content which does not differ between the index and working
           tree may be shown on context lines, beginning with a " "
           (space). You can stage context lines for removal by converting
           the space to a "-". The resulting working tree file will
           appear to re-add the content.

       modifying existing content
           One can also modify context lines by staging them for removal
           (by converting " " to "-") and adding a "+" line with the new
           content. Similarly, one can modify "+" lines for existing
           additions or modifications. In all cases, the new modification
           will appear reverted in the working tree.

       new content
           You may also add new content that does not exist in the patch;
           simply add new lines, each starting with "+". The addition
           will appear reverted in the working tree.

       There are also several operations which should be avoided
       entirely, as they will make the patch impossible to apply:

       •   adding context (" ") or removal ("-") lines

       •   deleting context or removal lines

       •   modifying the contents of context or removal lines

CONFIGURATION         top

       Everything below this line in this section is selectively included
       from the git-config(1) documentation. The content is the same as
       what’s found there:

       add.ignoreErrors, add.ignore-errors (deprecated)
           Tells git add to continue adding files when some files cannot
           be added due to indexing errors. Equivalent to the
           --ignore-errors option.  add.ignore-errors is deprecated, as
           it does not follow the usual naming convention for
           configuration variables.

SEE ALSO         top

       git-status(1) git-rm(1) git-reset(1) git-mv(1) git-commit(1)
       git-update-index(1)

GIT         top

       Part of the git(1) suite

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of the git (Git distributed version control
       system) project.  Information about the project can be found at 
       ⟨http://git-scm.com/⟩.  If you have a bug report for this manual
       page, see ⟨http://git-scm.com/community⟩.  This page was obtained
       from the project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨https://github.com/git/git.git⟩ on 2025-02-02.  (At that time,
       the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
       repository was 2025-01-31.)  If you discover any rendering
       problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there is
       a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
       corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
       (which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
       man-pages@man7.org

Git 2.48.1.166.g58b580          2025-01-31                     GIT-ADD(1)

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