How to change the remote a branch is tracking?

787
votes

The central repository had to be set up on a new server, so I created a new remote on my local repo, and pushed to that.

But now when I do git pull, it claims I am up to date. It's wrong—it's telling me about the old remote branch, not the new one, which I know for a fact has new commits to fetch.

How do I change my local branch to track a different remote?

I can see this in the git config file but I don't want to mess things up.

[branch "master"]
    remote = oldserver
    merge = refs/heads/master
14
git
I tweaked your title - you're actually trying to change the remote you're tracking, but still track the same branch name in it. – Cascabel
possible duplicate of How do you make an existing Git branch track a remote branch? – user289086
It is difficult to consider this a duplicate of How do you make an existing Git branch track a remote branch?. That question doesn't specify that the branch is already tracking a remote branch. This one does. – user456814
seems to me like editing the config file is the easiest and safest way to go about this – Steven Lu

14 Answers

1282
votes

Using git v1.8.0 or later:

git branch branch_name --set-upstream-to your_new_remote/branch_name

Or you can use the -u switch

git branch branch_name -u your_new_remote/branch_name

Using git v1.7.12 or earlier

git branch --set-upstream branch_name your_new_remote/branch_name
108
votes

For me the fix was:

git remote set-url origin https://some_url/some_repo

Then:

git push
63
votes

With an up to date git (2.5.5) the command is the following : 

git branch --set-upstream-to=origin/branch

This will update the remote tracked branch for your current local branch

28
votes

Another option to have a lot of control over what's happening is to edit your configurations by hand:

git config --edit

or the shorthand

git config -e

Then edit the file at will, save and your modifications will be applied.

19
votes

If you're sane about it, editing the config file's safe enough. If you want to be a little more paranoid, you can use the porcelain command to modify it:

git config branch.master.remote newserver

Of course, if you look at the config before and after, you'll see that it did exactly what you were going to do.

But in your individual case, what I'd do is:

git remote rename origin old-origin
git remote rename new-origin origin

That is, if the new server is going to be the canonical remote, why not call it origin as if you'd originally cloned from it?

10
votes

This is the easiest command: 

git push --set-upstream <new-origin> <branch-to-track>

For example, given the command git remote -v produces something like: 

origin  ssh://[email protected]/~myself/projectr.git (fetch)
origin  ssh://[email protected]/~myself/projectr.git (push)
team    ssh://[email protected]/vbs/projectr.git (fetch)
team    ssh://[email protected]/vbs/projectr.git (push)

To change to tracking the team instead:

git push --set-upstream team master
7
votes
git fetch origin
git checkout --track -b local_branch_name origin/branch_name

or

git fetch
git checkout -b local_branch_name origin/branch_name
4
votes

You could either delete your current branch and do:

git branch --track local_branch remote_branch

Or change change remote server to the current one in the config

2
votes

Based on what I understand from the latest git documentation, the synopsis is: 

git branch -u upstream-branch local-branch
git branch --set-upstream-to=upstream-branch local-branch

This usage seems to be a bit different than urschrei's answer, as in his the synopsis is: 

git branch local-branch -u upstream-branch 
git branch local-branch --set-upstream-to=upstream-branch

I'm guessing they changed the documentation again?

2
votes

I've found @critikaster's post helpful, except that I had to perform these commands with GIT 2.21:

$ git remote set-url origin https://some_url/some_repo
$ git push --set-upstream origin master
1
votes

In latest git version like 2.7.4,

git checkout branch_name #branch name which you want to change tracking branch

git branch --set-upstream-to=upstream/tracking_branch_name #upstream - remote name

1
votes

Based on the git documentation the best way is:

  1. be sure the actual origin path:

git remote -v

  1. Then make the change with:

git remote set-url origin

where url-repository is the same URL that we get from the clone option.

0
votes

the easiest way is to simply push to the new branch:

git push -u origin branch/name

0
votes

After trying the above and searching, searching, etc. I realized none of my changes were on the server that were on my local branch and Visual Studio in Team Explorer did not indicate this branch tracked a remote branch. The remote branch was there, so it should have worked. I ended up deleting the remote branch on github and 're' Push my local branch that had my changes that were not being tracked for an unknown reason.

By deleting the remote branch and 're' Push my local branch that was not being tracked, the local branch was re-created on git hub. I tried to this at the command prompt (using Windows) I could not get my local branch to track the remote branch until I did this. Everything is back to normal.