How to list all commits that changed a specific file?

git commit

371,549

Solution 1

The --follow works for a particular file

git log --follow -- filename

Difference to other solutions given

Note that other solutions include git log path (without the --follow). That approach is handy if you want to track e.g. changes in a directory, but stumbles when files were renamed (thus use --follow filename).

Solution 2

I have been looking at this closely and all these answers don‘t seem to really show me all the commits across all the branches.

Here is what I have come up with by messing around with the gitk edit view options. This shows me all the commits for a file regardless of branch, local, reflog, and remote.

gitk --all --first-parent --remotes --reflog --author-date-order -- filename

It also works with git log:

git log --all --first-parent --remotes --reflog --author-date-order -- filename

Solution 3

git log path should do what you want. From the git log man page:

[--] <path>…

Show only commits that affect any of the specified paths. To prevent confusion with
options and branch names, paths may need to be prefixed with "-- " to separate them
from options or refnames.

Solution 4

Use the command below to get commits for a specific file:

git log -p filename

Solution 5

It should be as simple as git log <somepath>; check the manpage (git-log(1)).

Personally I like to use git log --stat <path> so I can see the impact of each commit on the file.

View more solutions

371,549

Author by

Daniel

Updated on July 13, 2022

Comments

Daniel almost 2 years

Is there a way to list all commits that changed a specific file?
- benhorgen over 4 years
  
  Are you looking for changes to a file across a single branch; across all local branches; across all branches on a single remote; or across it all? I think across it all will require a script.
Cascabel almost 14 years

Or even -p if you want to see the full diff, not just that it had some number of lines modified.
rfunduk almost 14 years

True, but that's pretty noisy considering most files have been changed many times over their lives. I don't want to see full diffs of every single commit that ever touched a file. I'm usually looking for a specific thing, so I can get a log with just impacts and then git show on the specific commits that look like they matter.
Yo Ludke about 11 years

This is better, it seems to list the commits concerning the file across all commits unlike just ` git log <somepath>`
Ibrahim Quraish almost 11 years

+1 --follow accounts for renames, so this is more robust than git log -- path
kwahn about 10 years

Does not work if the file's path has changed. jackrabbit's answer does work for this case.
StvnW over 9 years

--follow works for a single path, which could be a directory. If passed a directory it will run recursively and report changes to all files below that point.
StvnW over 9 years

Note that --follow accepts a path, which can be a file but also a directory. In the case of the latter it will run recursively and report changes to all files below that point. (This behaviour is not documented in the manpage and may not be permanent.)
VaTo about 9 years

Whats the difference between that one and just git log filename?
MarSoft about 9 years

@SaulOrtega, git log filename doesn't follow file renaming, i.e. it will show all commits regarding that filename (not actual file). If you create files X and Y, changed both, then deleted Y and renamed X to Y and then also changed it, and you run git log Y, you will get messages for both old Y and new one. And the opposite, with --follow you will get commits regarding that file when it was named X and when it was named Y.
Lebnik almost 9 years

use "git log --all filename" for view all commits in all branches
zkent over 8 years

I understand that this doesn't exactly answer the question since he wanted a list of commits but this is gold and going in my file.
earthmeLon over 8 years

This is perfect for when someone makes changes but they forget where they commited the changes.
Tino about 8 years

For git newbies: Use git log -p --follow -- filename to display the changes as well. Also note: "filename" can be a file, a directory or a submodule.
Aaron Swan over 7 years

This works if you need to restrict the log to a specific branch
Juan Antonio Tubío about 7 years

Very useful. Includes also stash commits
code over 6 years

Any way to do this using the GitHub API for a particular file?
reducing activity almost 6 years

@AbhishekSoni That seems to be a new question.
Anentropic almost 6 years

or without the [branch]
Cubic almost 6 years

@Anentropic The square brackets were supposed to indicate that the argument is optional.
ThanhLD over 5 years

It's all that I need, It shows full change, includes some change from the merge.
borneo777 over 5 years

Does this command (git log --follow -- filename) view all commits in all branches?
Sergio Belevskij over 5 years

git log --stat --follow -- *.html => output list of commits with exactly one files in each commit. Very nice!
Danilo Souza Morães over 5 years

-- is used in several unix commands to indicate file names. Since --follow is a valid file name in unix, if you wanted to show the logs for that file and types git log --follow it would be interpreted as the --follow option, not the file, so you would do: git log -- --follow
Sławomir Lenart about 5 years

use with -p to not only list but preview the followed changes.
carl verbiest almost 5 years

This should be the prefered answer. The question was to find all commits, this one does.
Soren Bjornstad almost 5 years

Notice that --reflog includes commits which were rebased/amended or otherwise discarded. Maybe that should be obvious, but I tried to use this with git log and was trying to figure out why I was seeing seemingly duplicated commits!
Soren Bjornstad almost 5 years

This won't work at all if the file doesn't exist in the currently checked-out branch. You can add the branch like git log -p mybranch -- filename or just use git log --all -- filename to look in all branches.
Soren Bjornstad over 4 years

For Windows users, note that gitk is bundled with Git for Windows.
Hilikus about 4 years

the last argument is not really the filename. it should be the full path (absolute or relative) to the file. Just using the filename doesn't return anything since git can't find the file. i.e. -- src/main/java/hello.java, not -- hello.java
Petr Bodnár over 3 years

Agreed with @Hilikus. For example, if you want to search for hello.java changes anywhere in the tree, you may use -- **/hello.java. Git documentation seems to be utterly underdocumented on this.
Ewan over 3 years

I don't get it..the accepted answer by @gabe-moothart shows all parent commits of the commit that creates a file on my test tree - ie commits that don't modify the file. This answer works perfectly on my test repo though.
Peter Mortensen about 3 years

The link is broken: HTTP: "techpurohit.com has expired and is parked free". HTTPS: "An error occurred during a connection to www.techpurohit.com. PR_END_OF_FILE_ERROR"
K. Symbol about 3 years

However, this only shows the changes for this file in each commit, how to let gitk show all changes (including this file and other files that co-changes)?
destroyer22719 almost 3 years

I like your answer better because --oneline works whereas -p doesn't work for that flag.
mz0 almost 3 years

this is a life-saver (should I say "file-saver")) when branch was forcefully rewritten
Niko O over 2 years

For posterity: In my version of git (2.33.0.windows.2.7.g2aa9e28d2a.20210908104152) I have to not use the double-dash before the file path, even when looking for a file and not a directory.
Olivier over 2 years

@NikoO: In my version (2.34.1), using that double-dash seems totally optional, but works well if typed.
Moberg about 2 years

THANK YOU, this needs more upvotes. git log --full-diff --stat -- <path> was the command I was looking for. :)