About branches

Introducing branches

Branches allow you to develop features, fix bugs, or safely experiment with new ideas in a contained area of your repository.

You always create a branch from an existing branch. Typically, you might create a new branch from the default branch of your repository. You can then work on this new branch in isolation from changes that other people are making to the repository. A branch you create to build a feature is commonly referred to as a feature branch or topic branch. For more information, see "Creating and deleting branches within your repository."

You can also use a branch to publish a GitHub Pages site. For more information, see "What is GitHub Pages?"

You must have write access to a repository to create a branch, open a pull request, or delete and restore branches in a pull request. For more information, see "Access permissions on GitHub Enterprise."

About the default branch

When you create a repository on GitHub with content, the repository is initialized with a single branch, called the default branch. The default branch is the branch that GitHub displays when anyone visits your repository. The default branch is also the initial branch that Git checks out locally out when someone clones the repository. The default branch is the base branch in your repository, against which all pull requests and code commits are automatically made, unless you specify a different branch.

If you have admin permissions to a repository, you can change the default branch to another existing branch. For more information, see "Setting the default branch."

Working with branches

Once you're satisfied with your work, you can open a pull request to merge the changes in the current branch (the head branch) into another branch (the base branch). For more information, see "About pull requests."

After a pull request has been merged, or closed, you can delete the head branch as this is no longer needed. You must have write access in the repository to delete branches. You can't delete branches that are directly associated with open pull requests. For more information, see "Deleting and restoring branches in a pull request"

Working with protected branches

Repository administrators can enable protections on a branch. If you're working on a branch that's protected, you won't be able to delete or force push to the branch. Repository administrators can additionally enable several other protected branch settings to enforce various workflows before a branch can be merged.

To see if your pull request can be merged, look in the merge box at the bottom of the pull request's Conversation tab. For more information, see "About protected branches."

When a branch is protected:

• You won't be able to delete or force push to the branch.
• If required status checks are enabled on the branch, you won't be able to merge changes into the branch until all of the required CI tests pass. For more information, see "About status checks."
• If required pull request reviews are enabled on the branch, you won't be able to merge changes into the branch until all requirements in the pull request review policy have been met. For more information, see "Merging a pull request."
• If required review from a code owner is enabled on a branch, and a pull request modifies code that has an owner, a code owner must approve the pull request before it can be merged. For more information, see "About code owners."
• If required commit signing is enabled on a branch, you won't be able to push any commits to the branch that are not signed and verified. For more information, see "About commit signature verification" and "About required commit signing."

Further reading

• "About pull requests"
• "Branch" in the GitHub glossary
• "Branches in a Nutshell" in the Git documentation