Git

Reflog Commands

Reflog is your safety net - it records every change to HEAD, even those not in the commit history. Learn to recover from mistakes, find lost commits, and understand Git's reference logging system.

5 commands

Pro Tips

Reflog entries expire after 90 days by default. For important recovery, act sooner rather than later.

Use 'git reflog show branch-name' to see the history of a specific branch, not just HEAD.

After finding a lost commit in reflog, use 'git cherry-pick' or 'git reset' to restore it.

Common Mistakes

Reflog is local only - it won't help you recover commits that existed only on another machine.

Running 'git gc' can remove unreferenced commits. Don't garbage collect if you need to recover something.

Commands

View reflog

$ git reflog

Show reference log (all HEAD changes).

Reflog for branch

$ git reflog <branch>

Show reflog for specific branch.

Recover deleted branch

$ git checkout -b <branch> <reflog-entry>

Restore branch from reflog entry.

Recover lost commit

$ git cherry-pick <reflog-hash>

Recover commit from reflog.

Reset to reflog entry

$ git reset --hard HEAD@{5}

Reset to previous HEAD state.

Git