How to get second last commit hash in git

Question

I am using below git command to get last 2 commit hash

git log -n 2 --pretty=format:"%H"  #To get only hash value of commit

But I needs only second last commit hash.

Any help would be great

Thanks

amalloy · Accepted Answer · 2019-06-13T18:32:42.917

36

git rev-parse @~

rev-parse turns various notations into hashes, @ is current head, and ~ is the previous commit.

This generalizes to commits arbitrarily far back: for example, you can write @~3 (or @~~~) to specify "three commits before the current head".

edited Jun 13 '19 at 18:32

answered Sep 01 '15 at 06:01

amalloy

2

I think one crucial thing is missing here: the revision selector `@~` also accepts a number after the `~`, e.g. `@~3` means: the parent (`~`) of the parent of the parent (`3` times) of HEAD (`@`). ([see git documentation](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Tools-Revision-Selection#_ancestry_references)) – Gerrit-K Aug 10 '18 at 07:17
@Griddo should probably edit that in, as that is _insanely_ helpful. – Tom Granot Jun 13 '19 at 10:20
1

Fair enough, @t0mgs. Not strictly necessary in a question about "the previous commit", but people might well get here looking for some other previous commit. – amalloy Jun 13 '19 at 18:33
@amalloy i.e. moi, for example! :) – Tom Granot Jun 13 '19 at 20:32
I prefer to use `HEAD` with index. i.e. to **last commit** I would use `git rev-parse HEAD~0`, to **penultimeate commit** `git rev-parse HEAD~1`, etc. – ferpaxecosanxez May 11 '22 at 13:32

Ashwani · Answer 2 · 2015-09-01T06:08:45.467

21

Use skip attribute
--skip=<number> skips number commits before starting to show the commit output.

git log -n 1 --skip 1 --pretty=format:"%H"

Follow this link for more info on git log

edited Sep 01 '15 at 06:08

answered Sep 01 '15 at 06:01

Ashwani

1

I like this more than the accepted answer, because I find this skip parameter very intuitive – Kutzi Nov 09 '21 at 15:41
Also works with git rev-list: git rev-list --skip 1 -n1 HEAD – Kutzi Nov 09 '21 at 15:43

score 4 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 01 '15 at 06:01

4

You can just pipe the output of your command through tail:

git log -n 2 --pretty=format:"%H" | tail -1

answered Sep 01 '15 at 06:01

Paul R

3 Answers3