How do I undo a checkout in git?
GitGit Problem Overview
I just checked out an earlier commit from my local git repo. I haven't made any changes to it, I was just looking at it. Now I want to go back to my latest commit - how do I do that?
The exact command I used to check it out:
git checkout e5dff6b3c5d704f9b598de46551355d18235ac08
Now when I type git log, at the top I see this checked out commit, but none of my later commits. Did I accidentally delete those?
Git Solutions
Solution 1 - Git
Try this first:
git checkout master
(If you're on a different branch than master (or main), use the branch name there instead.)
If that doesn't work, try...
For a single file:
git checkout HEAD /path/to/file
For the entire repository working copy:
git reset --hard HEAD
And if that doesn't work, then you can look in the reflog to find your old head SHA and reset to that:
git reflog
git reset --hard <sha from reflog>
HEAD is a name that always points to the latest commit in your current branch.
Solution 2 - Git
To undo git checkout do git checkout -, similarly to cd and cd - in shell.
Solution 3 - Git
You probably want git checkout master, or git checkout [branchname].
Solution 4 - Git
If you are using github, chances are the name for default branch is no longer master. Try git checkout main instead.