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This version of GitHub Enterprise was discontinued on 2023-03-15. No patch releases will be made, even for critical security issues. For better performance, improved security, and new features, upgrade to the latest version of GitHub Enterprise. For help with the upgrade, contact GitHub Enterprise support.

Changing your GitHub username

In this article

You can change the username for your account on your GitHub Enterprise Server instance if your instance uses built-in authentication.

Note: If you sign into your GitHub Enterprise Server instance with LDAP credentials or single sign-on (SSO), only your local administrator can change your username. For more information about authentication methods for GitHub Enterprise Server, see "Managing IAM for your enterprise."

About username changes

You can change your username to another username that is not currently in use.

After changing your username, your old username becomes available for anyone else to claim. Most references to your repositories under the old username automatically change to the new username. However, some links to your profile won't automatically redirect.

GitHub Enterprise Server cannot set up redirects for:

  • @mentions using your old username
  • Links to gists that include your old username

If the account namespace includes any packages or container images stored in a GitHub Packages registry, GitHub transfers the packages and container images to the new namespace. By renaming your account, you may break projects that depend on these packages.

Repository references

After you change your username, GitHub Enterprise Server will automatically redirect references to your repositories.

  • Web links to your existing repositories will continue to work. This can take a few minutes to complete after you make the change.
  • Command line pushes from your local repository clones to the old remote tracking URLs will continue to work.

If the new owner of your old username creates a repository with the same name as your repository, that will override the redirect entry and your redirect will stop working. Because of this possibility, we recommend you update all existing remote repository URLs after changing your username. For more information, see "Managing remote repositories."

Links to your previous profile page

After changing your username, links to your previous profile page, such as https://[hostname]/previoususername, will return a 404 error. We recommend updating any links to your account on your GitHub Enterprise Server instance from elsewhere.

Your Git commits

If your Git commits are associated with another email address you've added to your GitHub account, they'll continue to be attributed to you and appear in your contributions graph after you've changed your username. For more information on setting your email address, see "Setting your commit email address" and "Adding an email address to your GitHub account."

Your gists

After changing your username, the URLs to any public or secret gists will also change and previous links to these will return a 404 error. We recommend updating the links to these gists anywhere you may have shared them.

CODEOWNERS files

After changing your username, CODEOWNERS files that include your old username will need to be manually updated. When you view the CODEOWNERS files on GitHub.com, an error message is displayed if the file contains any unknown users, or users without write access. We recommend updating all relevant CODEOWNERS files with your new username. For more information, see "About code owners."

Changing your username

  1. In the upper-right corner of any page, click your profile photo, then click Settings.

    Screenshot of GitHub's account menu showing options for users to view and edit their profile, content, and settings. The menu item "Settings" is outlined in dark orange.

  2. In the left sidebar, click Account.

  3. In the "Change username" section, click Change username.

Further reading