Undo git pull, how to bring repos to old state

Question

Is there any way to revert or undo git pull so that my source/repos will come to old state that was before doing git pull ? I want to do this because it merged some files which I didn't want to do so, but only merge other remaining files. So, I want to get those files back, is that possible?

EDIT: I want to undo git merge for clarification. After seeing some answers, I did this

git reflog
bb3139b... HEAD@{0}: pull : Fast forward
01b34fa... HEAD@{1}: clone: from ...name...

Now, what should I do ? Doing git reset --hard is OK ? I don't want to screw it again, so asking for detailed steps ?

Solution 1

Running git pull performs the following tasks, in order:

1. git fetch
2. git merge

The merge step combines branches that have been setup to be merged in your config. You want to undo the merge step, but probably not the fetch (doesn't make a lot of sense and shouldn't be necessary).

To undo the merge, use git reset --hard to reset the local repository to a previous state; use git-reflog to find the SHA-1 of the previous state and then reset to it.

Warning

The commands listed in this section remove all uncommitted changes, potentially leading to a loss of work:

git reset --hard

Alternatively, reset to a particular point in time, such as:

git reset --hard master@{"10 minutes ago"}

Solution 2

Same as jkp's answer, but here's the full command:

git reset --hard a0d3fe6

where a0d3fe6 is found by doing

git reflog

and looking at the point at which you want to undo to.

Solution 3

A more modern way to undo a merge is:

git merge --abort

And the slightly older way:

git reset --merge

The old-school way described in previous answers (warning: will discard all your local changes):

git reset --hard

But actually, it is worth noticing that git merge --abort is only equivalent to git reset --merge given that MERGE_HEAD is present. This can be read in the git help for merge command.

git merge --abort is equivalent to git reset --merge when MERGE_HEAD is present.

After a failed merge, when there is no MERGE_HEAD, the failed merge can be undone with git reset --merge but not necessarily with git merge --abort, so they are not only old and new syntax for the same thing. This is why i find git reset --merge to be much more useful in everyday work.

Solution 4

it works first use: git reflog

find your SHA of your previus state and make (HEAD@{1} is an example)

git reset --hard HEAD@{1}

Solution 5

Suppose $COMMIT was the last commit id before you performed git pull. What you need to undo the last pull is

git reset --hard $COMMIT

.

Bonus:

In speaking of pull, I would like to share an interesting trick,

git pull --rebase

This above command is the most useful command in my git life which saved a lots of time.

Before pushing your newly commit to server, try this command and it will automatically sync latest server changes (with a fetch + merge) and will place your commit at the top in git log. No need to worry about manual pull/merge.

Find details at: http://gitolite.com/git-pull--rebase

View more solutions

Comments

[jkp]

It looks like you only have two things in your history: a clone and a fetch. Just reset to the clone: git reset --hard 01b34fa, in this case you could have done git reset --hard HEAD^ which resets to one commit before the HEAD.

[William Pursell]

--hard is necessary if you want to modify files in your working dir

[jkp]

@seg.server.fault: if it worked, you can always accept the answer ;)

[funroll]

git reset --hard HEAD^

[Vladimir Vukanac]

git reflog will show everything what have been done with git. There is a concern that git reset --hard [sha1 of something from reflog] will revert everything what is shown in reflog, which sometimes are not goal, eg. you want to revert merge on master branch pulled from origin with bad data (happens), and after that merge you have worked on other branches. reflog will show every chage on other branches. But git checkout master and git reset --hard [SH1 of commit on master branch just before merge] will reset only current master branch removing pulled merge from origin.

[Kaz]

It's good to get out of the git pull habit. Always use git fetch and then intelligently decide on what to do next.

[Manish Goswami]

I have adde the latest answer !

[vsync]

Saw 999 votes so without reading I had to vote up for a round 1000 (mild OCD)

[Zelalem]

Another alternative way for HEAD^ is git reset --hard HEAD~1

[Cascabel]

An excellent way to pick the previous state, instead of using git-reflog and copying hashes, is to use a shortcut like master@{1}, which is the previous position of master, master@{"5 minutes ago"}, or master@{14:30}. Full details on specifying revisions in this way can be found in man git-rev-parse, in the section called "specifying revisions".

[Anonigan]

In this case ORIG_HEAD should also work ("git reset --hard ORIG_HEAD")

[jkp]

@Jelfromi: thanks for that tip, I wasn't aware you could be so verbose about revisions. I knew about picking revisions relative to HEAD, but when the question was posed I didn't knowhow far back in time he wanted to go.

[Evan Moran]

This is worth running if you haven't seen it. It pops up a crazy GUI.

[Thai]

When I pulled, it says Updating d2c90a3..035ac4d. Here, you can also use d2c90a3 as a parameter to reset.

[Simon The Cat]

You don't need to type hashes when you use reflog. You can also use HEAD@{1} or what ever previous number as defined in the reflog.

[Rana Ghosh]

When I type git reflog I don't see anything about merges in there. The most recent things are checkouts and before that is stuff I was doing before git pull. Can you give me a better clue as to how to find this merge SHA-1?

[mc9]

Why can't I just do git reset HEAD --hard, for instance?

[xji]

@MikeC This approach allows you to go back several pulls, for instance

[E. Sundin]

I wasn't able to use the left side ids but git reset --hard HEAD@{n} worked

[Abhishek Anand]

You should have suggested an edit to jkp's answer instead of almost replicating it here after so many years.

[Abhishek Anand]

git merge --abort works DURING a merge, not after git pull is finished. So this answer seems irrelevant to the question.

[pmiranda]

If I have this on git reflog: dab04ec HEAD@{0}, aaaaaaa HEAD@{1} and bbbbbbb HEAD@{2}. If I do git reset --hard bbbbbbbI will lost the HEAD 0 and 1 ?

[Jeffrey Sun]

@pmirnd Yes, you will lose both HEAD 0 and 1.

[Lola]

i loooove you :)

[Cory McAboy]

You saved my day.

[theadriangreen]

git reset --merge deletes all changes not staged for commit. Found this out the hard way.

[Ernesto Alfonso]

this response is very useful , because if we do an git pull origin branch wi get something like this Updating ffce65bd..e929e884, the do git reset --hard ffce65bd

[Pradeep B P]

- git reflog, then check the HEAD, - git reset --hard HEAD@{11} This worked for me

[Muhammad]

WARNING : git reset --hard master@{"10 minutes ago"} also deletes all the changes that are not staged yet!

[brugobi]

WARNING ::git reset --hard master@{"10 minutes ago"} made my repo like the first commit, I lost everything

[Bersan]

fatal: There is no merge to abort (MERGE_HEAD missing) Does not work even during a (unsuccessful) merge

[JMess]

WARNING: git reset --hard master@{"10 minutes ago"} deleted almost my entire git history