How do you revert to a specific tag in Git?

Question

I know how to revert to older commits in a Git branch, but how do I revert back to a branch's state dictated by a tag? I envision something like this:

git revert -bytag "Version 1.0 Revision 1.5"

Is this possible?

Do you want to "rewind the branch" (i.e., *remove* commits), or add a *new* commit to the current branch, that sets up the branch so that all files are "the way they were at the commit given by that tag"? — torek, Aug 20 '13 at 21:45
Either should get the job done, though I think I would rather add a new commit to the current branch in the manner you describe — zachd1_618, Aug 21 '13 at 00:50
In that case, use the `git checkout .` method from [this answer](http://stackoverflow.com/a/4114122/1256452). — torek, Aug 21 '13 at 01:10

score 177 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 20 '14 at 16:39

177

Git tags are just pointers to the commit. So you use them the same way as you do HEAD, branch names or commit sha hashes. You can use tags with any git command that accepts commit/revision arguments. You can try it with git rev-parse tagname to display the commit it points to.

In your case you have at least these two alternatives:

Reset the current branch to specific tag:
```
git reset --hard tagname
```
Generate revert commit on top to get you to the state of the tag:
```
git revert tag
```

This might introduce some conflicts if you have merge commits though.

edited Mar 20 '14 at 16:39

the Tin Man

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answered Aug 21 '13 at 09:49

jurglic

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I think "git revert " reverts the changes in the tagged commit, instead of restoring your working copy to that version. – Matt Dec 22 '14 at 20:32
To also get rid of untracked / unversioned files, follow https://stackoverflow.com/a/912737/923560 – Abdull Feb 15 '18 at 14:48
8

Like @Matt said, the accepted answer is simply incorrect, as it only reverts the changes in the tagged commit. Your best bet is to use commit hashes, and follow this answer: https://stackoverflow.com/a/4114122/6348485 – Swagga Ting May 26 '20 at 16:56
2

Hi, could you explain "generate revert commit on top to get you to the state of the tag:"? I have no idea what this means unfortunately. – John Little Sep 20 '20 at 19:23
`git revert` just doesn't work. Looks like there's no way without forcing the push. Not the best for a control version software – Christian Vincenzo Traina Feb 07 '23 at 10:24

score 19 · Answer 2 · answered Aug 20 '13 at 21:21

19

Use git reset:

git reset --hard "Version 1.0 Revision 1.5"

(assuming that the specified string is the tag).

answered Aug 20 '13 at 21:21

devnull

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score 6 · Answer 3 · answered May 27 '21 at 18:17

If you are:

sure about which commit you want to get back to
get rid of all the commits after that
apply changes to your remote

reset to a tag named reset-to-here
```
git reset --hard reset-to-here
```
push your change to the remote forcing by +
```
git push origin +master
```

score 4 · Answer 4 · answered Oct 04 '20 at 09:46

4

You can use git checkout.

I tried the accepted solution but got an error, warning: refname '<tagname>' is ambiguous'

But as the answer states, tags do behave like a pointer to a commit, so as you would with a commit hash, you can just checkout the tag. The only difference is you preface it with tags/:

git checkout tags/<tagname>

answered Oct 04 '20 at 09:46

joshi123

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I suppose in this way you're getting a detached HEAD – Christian Vincenzo Traina Mar 03 '23 at 17:08
sounds painful! :) – joshi123 Mar 05 '23 at 07:42
It is not, according to Joseph-Ignace Guillotin – Christian Vincenzo Traina Mar 05 '23 at 13:19
That may be a different problem with a tag and branch of the same name, and the fully qualified tag name is needed. See: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/28192422/git-warning-refname-xxx-is-ambiguous/ – Ben Butzer May 16 '23 at 14:16

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered May 10 '23 at 14:26

I've been looking for a solution to this problem for a long time. After a lot of research I can state that there is not a solution to this problem:

git reset --hard <tagname> will change the history. It's not a revert
git revert <tagname> will only apply the change of that specific commit
git revert <hash1>..<hash2> won't work if there are merge. And even if you can specify the parent, this operation may be tedious if there are several merges. We have also to consider that every single revert must be wisely chosen and tested, if we don't want to break our branch. git rebase and git cherry-pick have the same problem.

So this is the only thing that worked for me:

git checkout <tag name>
mkdir ../tmp
cp -r . ../tmp
git checkout master
cp -rf ../tmp/* .
rm -rf ../tmp
git commit -m "Revert"
git push

How do you revert to a specific tag in Git?

5 Answers5