In Git, branches are essentially pointers to commits. While branches don’t have a “parent branch” in a strict sense (since Git tracks commits, not branch ancestry), developers often want to know which branch a new branch was created from. This is commonly referred to as the parent branch.
Here are several practical ways to identify the parent branch of a Git branch.
📌 What Is a Parent Branch?
The parent branch is typically the branch you were on when you created a new branch using:
git checkout -b new-feature
For example, if you were on main when you ran that command, then main is considered the parent of new-feature.
Git itself does not store this relationship explicitly, but there are ways to infer it.
✅ Method 1: Use Git Merge Base
The git merge-base command helps identify the most recent common ancestor between two branches.
git merge-base new-feature main
Then compare it to the first commit on your new branch:
git log new-feature --not main
If the common ancestor is close to the first commit on your feature branch, it’s likely main is the parent.
✅ Method 2: Use Git Reflog
Git records every action in the reflog, including branch creation. To see where your current branch came from:
git reflog show new-feature
Look at the earliest entry. You might see something like:
abc123 HEAD@{0}: checkout: moving from main to new-feature
This indicates new-feature was created from main.
✅ Method 3: Compare with All Branches
You can write a script or use this command to check which branch shares the most recent common ancestor with your branch:
for branch in $(git branch --format='%(refname:short)'); do
echo "$branch: $(git merge-base HEAD $branch)"
done
Then manually inspect which branch has the closest shared commit.
✅ Method 4: Git Show-Branch (Legacy)
git show-branch
This displays branches and their divergence. You can often see which branches are most closely related based on the output.
🔍 Summary
| Method | Description |
|---|---|
git reflog | Shows the branch from which your current one was created |
git merge-base | Compares two branches to find a common ancestor |
git show-branch | Visual comparison of branch relationships |
| Commit logs | Reviewing git log can also give contextual clues |
🚫 Git Doesn’t Track “Parent Branches” Natively
It’s important to remember: Git tracks commits, not branches. So there’s no built-in concept of a “parent branch”—only a commit history you can analyze.
Pro Tip: Use Naming Conventions or Metadata
If knowing the parent branch is important in your workflow, consider:
- Naming branches with a prefix (e.g.,
feature/main/new-login) - Using commit messages or documentation to note branch ancestry
- Leveraging tools like GitHub or GitLab which may visually show branch origins in PRs/MRs
