Rename master Branch

Overview

This describes how to rename the master branch in Git.

Requirements

• An existing master branch

Steps

In this example, we will rename “master” to “main”.

1. Rename the local master branch

   $ git branch -m master main

2. Check the change

   $ git status
   On branch main
   Your branch is up to date with 'origin/master'.
   
   nothing to commit, working tree clean
   

3. Rename the remote master branch

   $ git push -u origin main

4. Remove the remote master branch

   $ git push origin --delete master

   • If you encounter a similar error message:

     To https://github.com/example/example.git
     ! [remote rejected]   master (refusing to delete the current branch: refs/heads/master)
     error: failed to push some refs to 'https://example@github.com/example/example.git'
     

     • Go to the management page for the remote branch and unset it as the default branch
     • Try this step again

5. Update any other remaining local repositories (e.g., a local master branch on another computer)

   1. Switch to the master branch

      $ git checkout master

   2. Rename the local master branch

      $ git branch -m master main

   3. Grab the latest changes from the remote branch into the local branch

      $ git fetch

   4. Remove the remote branch connection on the local branch

      $ git branch --unset-upstream

   5. Setup a new remote branch connection on the local branch

      $ git branch -u origin/main