1GIT-CLONE(1) Git Manual GIT-CLONE(1)
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6 git-clone - Clone a repository into a new directory
7
9 git clone [--template=<template_directory>]
10 [-l] [-s] [--no-hardlinks] [-q] [-n] [--bare] [--mirror]
11 [-o <name>] [-b <name>] [-u <upload-pack>] [--reference <repository>]
12 [--dissociate] [--separate-git-dir <git dir>]
13 [--depth <depth>] [--[no-]single-branch] [--no-tags]
14 [--recurse-submodules[=<pathspec>]] [--[no-]shallow-submodules]
15 [--jobs <n>] [--] <repository> [<directory>]
16
19 Clones a repository into a newly created directory, creates
20 remote-tracking branches for each branch in the cloned repository
21 (visible using git branch -r), and creates and checks out an initial
22 branch that is forked from the cloned repository’s currently active
23 branch.
24 After the clone, a plain git fetch without arguments will update all
26 the remote-tracking branches, and a git pull without arguments will in
27 addition merge the remote master branch into the current master branch,
28 if any (this is untrue when "--single-branch" is given; see below).
29 This default configuration is achieved by creating references to the
31 remote branch heads under refs/remotes/origin and by initializing
32 remote.origin.url and remote.origin.fetch configuration variables.
33
35 --local, -l
36 When the repository to clone from is on a local machine, this flag
37 bypasses the normal "Git aware" transport mechanism and clones the
38 repository by making a copy of HEAD and everything under objects
39 and refs directories. The files under .git/objects/ directory are
40 hardlinked to save space when possible.
41 If the repository is specified as a local path (e.g.,
43 /path/to/repo), this is the default, and --local is essentially a
44 no-op. If the repository is specified as a URL, then this flag is
45 ignored (and we never use the local optimizations). Specifying
46 --no-local will override the default when /path/to/repo is given,
47 using the regular Git transport instead.
48 --no-hardlinks
50 Force the cloning process from a repository on a local filesystem
51 to copy the files under the .git/objects directory instead of using
52 hardlinks. This may be desirable if you are trying to make a
53 back-up of your repository.
54 --shared, -s
56 When the repository to clone is on the local machine, instead of
57 using hard links, automatically setup .git/objects/info/alternates
58 to share the objects with the source repository. The resulting
59 repository starts out without any object of its own.
60 NOTE: this is a possibly dangerous operation; do not use it unless
62 you understand what it does. If you clone your repository using
63 this option and then delete branches (or use any other Git command
64 that makes any existing commit unreferenced) in the source
65 repository, some objects may become unreferenced (or dangling).
66 These objects may be removed by normal Git operations (such as git
67 commit) which automatically call git gc --auto. (See git-gc(1).) If
68 these objects are removed and were referenced by the cloned
69 repository, then the cloned repository will become corrupt.
70 Note that running git repack without the -l option in a repository
72 cloned with -s will copy objects from the source repository into a
73 pack in the cloned repository, removing the disk space savings of
74 clone -s. It is safe, however, to run git gc, which uses the -l
75 option by default.
76 If you want to break the dependency of a repository cloned with -s
78 on its source repository, you can simply run git repack -a to copy
79 all objects from the source repository into a pack in the cloned
80 repository.
81 --reference[-if-able] <repository>
83 If the reference repository is on the local machine, automatically
84 setup .git/objects/info/alternates to obtain objects from the
85 reference repository. Using an already existing repository as an
86 alternate will require fewer objects to be copied from the
87 repository being cloned, reducing network and local storage costs.
88 When using the --reference-if-able, a non existing directory is
89 skipped with a warning instead of aborting the clone.
90 NOTE: see the NOTE for the --shared option, and also the
92 --dissociate option.
93 --dissociate
95 Borrow the objects from reference repositories specified with the
96 --reference options only to reduce network transfer, and stop
97 borrowing from them after a clone is made by making necessary local
98 copies of borrowed objects. This option can also be used when
99 cloning locally from a repository that already borrows objects from
100 another repository—the new repository will borrow objects from the
101 same repository, and this option can be used to stop the borrowing.
102 --quiet, -q
104 Operate quietly. Progress is not reported to the standard error
105 stream.
106 --verbose, -v
108 Run verbosely. Does not affect the reporting of progress status to
109 the standard error stream.
110 --progress
112 Progress status is reported on the standard error stream by default
113 when it is attached to a terminal, unless -q is specified. This
114 flag forces progress status even if the standard error stream is
115 not directed to a terminal.
116 --no-checkout, -n
118 No checkout of HEAD is performed after the clone is complete.
119 --bare
121 Make a bare Git repository. That is, instead of creating
122 <directory> and placing the administrative files in
123 <directory>/.git, make the <directory> itself the $GIT_DIR. This
124 obviously implies the -n because there is nowhere to check out the
125 working tree. Also the branch heads at the remote are copied
126 directly to corresponding local branch heads, without mapping them
127 to refs/remotes/origin/. When this option is used, neither
128 remote-tracking branches nor the related configuration variables
129 are created.
130 --mirror
132 Set up a mirror of the source repository. This implies --bare.
133 Compared to --bare, --mirror not only maps local branches of the
134 source to local branches of the target, it maps all refs (including
135 remote-tracking branches, notes etc.) and sets up a refspec
136 configuration such that all these refs are overwritten by a git
137 remote update in the target repository.
138 --origin <name>, -o <name>
140 Instead of using the remote name origin to keep track of the
141 upstream repository, use <name>.
142 --branch <name>, -b <name>
144 Instead of pointing the newly created HEAD to the branch pointed to
145 by the cloned repository’s HEAD, point to <name> branch instead. In
146 a non-bare repository, this is the branch that will be checked out.
147 --branch can also take tags and detaches the HEAD at that commit in
148 the resulting repository.
149 --upload-pack <upload-pack>, -u <upload-pack>
151 When given, and the repository to clone from is accessed via ssh,
152 this specifies a non-default path for the command run on the other
153 end.
154 --template=<template_directory>
156 Specify the directory from which templates will be used; (See the
157 "TEMPLATE DIRECTORY" section of git-init(1).)
158 --config <key>=<value>, -c <key>=<value>
160 Set a configuration variable in the newly-created repository; this
161 takes effect immediately after the repository is initialized, but
162 before the remote history is fetched or any files checked out. The
163 key is in the same format as expected by git-config(1) (e.g.,
164 core.eol=true). If multiple values are given for the same key, each
165 value will be written to the config file. This makes it safe, for
166 example, to add additional fetch refspecs to the origin remote.
167 Due to limitations of the current implementation, some
169 configuration variables do not take effect until after the initial
170 fetch and checkout. Configuration variables known to not take
171 effect are: remote.<name>.mirror and remote.<name>.tagOpt. Use the
172 corresponding --mirror and --no-tags options instead.
173 --depth <depth>
175 Create a shallow clone with a history truncated to the specified
176 number of commits. Implies --single-branch unless
177 --no-single-branch is given to fetch the histories near the tips of
178 all branches. If you want to clone submodules shallowly, also pass
179 --shallow-submodules.
180 --shallow-since=<date>
182 Create a shallow clone with a history after the specified time.
183 --shallow-exclude=<revision>
185 Create a shallow clone with a history, excluding commits reachable
186 from a specified remote branch or tag. This option can be specified
187 multiple times.
188 --[no-]single-branch
190 Clone only the history leading to the tip of a single branch,
191 either specified by the --branch option or the primary branch
192 remote’s HEAD points at. Further fetches into the resulting
193 repository will only update the remote-tracking branch for the
194 branch this option was used for the initial cloning. If the HEAD at
195 the remote did not point at any branch when --single-branch clone
196 was made, no remote-tracking branch is created.
197 --no-tags
199 Don’t clone any tags, and set remote.<remote>.tagOpt=--no-tags in
200 the config, ensuring that future git pull and git fetch operations
201 won’t follow any tags. Subsequent explicit tag fetches will still
202 work, (see git-fetch(1)).
203 Can be used in conjunction with --single-branch to clone and
205 maintain a branch with no references other than a single cloned
206 branch. This is useful e.g. to maintain minimal clones of the
207 default branch of some repository for search indexing.
208 --recurse-submodules[=<pathspec]
210 After the clone is created, initialize and clone submodules within
211 based on the provided pathspec. If no pathspec is provided, all
212 submodules are initialized and cloned. This option can be given
213 multiple times for pathspecs consisting of multiple entries. The
214 resulting clone has submodule.active set to the provided pathspec,
215 or "." (meaning all submodules) if no pathspec is provided.
216 Submodules are initialized and cloned using their default settings.
218 This is equivalent to running git submodule update --init
219 --recursive <pathspec> immediately after the clone is finished.
220 This option is ignored if the cloned repository does not have a
221 worktree/checkout (i.e. if any of --no-checkout/-n, --bare, or
222 --mirror is given)
223 --[no-]shallow-submodules
225 All submodules which are cloned will be shallow with a depth of 1.
226 --separate-git-dir=<git dir>
228 Instead of placing the cloned repository where it is supposed to
229 be, place the cloned repository at the specified directory, then
230 make a filesystem-agnostic Git symbolic link to there. The result
231 is Git repository can be separated from working tree.
232 -j <n>, --jobs <n>
234 The number of submodules fetched at the same time. Defaults to the
235 submodule.fetchJobs option.
236 <repository>
238 The (possibly remote) repository to clone from. See the GIT URLS
239 section below for more information on specifying repositories.
240 <directory>
242 The name of a new directory to clone into. The "humanish" part of
243 the source repository is used if no directory is explicitly given
244 (repo for /path/to/repo.git and foo for host.xz:foo/.git). Cloning
245 into an existing directory is only allowed if the directory is
246 empty.
247
249 In general, URLs contain information about the transport protocol, the
250 address of the remote server, and the path to the repository. Depending
251 on the transport protocol, some of this information may be absent.
252 Git supports ssh, git, http, and https protocols (in addition, ftp, and
254 ftps can be used for fetching, but this is inefficient and deprecated;
255 do not use it).
256 The native transport (i.e. git:// URL) does no authentication and
258 should be used with caution on unsecured networks.
259 The following syntaxes may be used with them:
261 · ssh://[user@]host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
263 · git://host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
265 · http[s]://host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
267 · ftp[s]://host.xz[:port]/path/to/repo.git/
269 An alternative scp-like syntax may also be used with the ssh protocol:
271 · [user@]host.xz:path/to/repo.git/
273 This syntax is only recognized if there are no slashes before the first
275 colon. This helps differentiate a local path that contains a colon. For
276 example the local path foo:bar could be specified as an absolute path
277 or ./foo:bar to avoid being misinterpreted as an ssh url.
278 The ssh and git protocols additionally support ~username expansion:
280 · ssh://[user@]host.xz[:port]/~[user]/path/to/repo.git/
282 · git://host.xz[:port]/~[user]/path/to/repo.git/
284 · [user@]host.xz:/~[user]/path/to/repo.git/
286 For local repositories, also supported by Git natively, the following
288 syntaxes may be used:
289 · /path/to/repo.git/
291 · file:///path/to/repo.git/
293 These two syntaxes are mostly equivalent, except the former implies
295 --local option.
296 When Git doesn’t know how to handle a certain transport protocol, it
298 attempts to use the remote-<transport> remote helper, if one exists. To
299 explicitly request a remote helper, the following syntax may be used:
300 · <transport>::<address>
302 where <address> may be a path, a server and path, or an arbitrary
304 URL-like string recognized by the specific remote helper being invoked.
305 See gitremote-helpers(1) for details.
306 If there are a large number of similarly-named remote repositories and
308 you want to use a different format for them (such that the URLs you use
309 will be rewritten into URLs that work), you can create a configuration
310 section of the form:
311 [url "<actual url base>"]
313 insteadOf = <other url base>
314 For example, with this:
317 [url "git://git.host.xz/"]
319 insteadOf = host.xz:/path/to/
320 insteadOf = work:
321 a URL like "work:repo.git" or like "host.xz:/path/to/repo.git" will be
324 rewritten in any context that takes a URL to be
325 "git://git.host.xz/repo.git".
326 If you want to rewrite URLs for push only, you can create a
328 configuration section of the form:
329 [url "<actual url base>"]
331 pushInsteadOf = <other url base>
332 For example, with this:
335 [url "ssh://example.org/"]
337 pushInsteadOf = git://example.org/
338 a URL like "git://example.org/path/to/repo.git" will be rewritten to
341 "ssh://example.org/path/to/repo.git" for pushes, but pulls will still
342 use the original URL.
343
345 · Clone from upstream:
346 $ git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/.../linux.git my-linux
348 $ cd my-linux
349 $ make
350 · Make a local clone that borrows from the current directory, without
353 checking things out:
354 $ git clone -l -s -n . ../copy
356 $ cd ../copy
357 $ git show-branch
358 · Clone from upstream while borrowing from an existing local
361 directory:
362 $ git clone --reference /git/linux.git \
364 git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/.../linux.git \
365 my-linux
366 $ cd my-linux
367 · Create a bare repository to publish your changes to the public:
370 $ git clone --bare -l /home/proj/.git /pub/scm/proj.git
372
375 Part of the git(1) suite
376Git 2.21.0 02/24/2019 GIT-CLONE(1)