Create new branch based on current branch to work on a new feature

How do I create a new branch in git to begin work on a new feature?

git

I want the new branch to be a local branch, and a copy of the current branch (ie, the new branch's HEAD should be the same as the current HEAD).

Question differentiation:

1 Answer
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TL;DR:

To create and start work on a new branch called FEATURE, you do:

FEATURE

git checkout -b FEATURE


Detailed explanation

To create a branch called FEATURE:

FEATURE

git branch FEATURE


However, this does not change your current branch.

You can then checkout the newly created branch (which means make to it the branch you're currently working on:

checkout

git checkout FEATURE


(You can see the current branch marked with a * in the output of git branch --list.)

*

git branch --list

Generally you want to start working in the branch you have just created, so the shortcut equivalent for both commands is git checkout -b FEATURE, which creates a new branch, then does checkout on it.

git checkout -b FEATURE

checkout

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