How to determine the URL that a local Git repository was originally cloned from

Question

I pulled a project with several forks on GitHub, but forgot which fork it was. How do I determine which fork I pulled?

Core

With git 2.7 (Q4 2015), git remote get-url origin will be possible. See my answer below – Majolica

git remote get-url origin does not work for me--possibly deprecated? git remote show origin worked though. – Haematoma

git remote -v give you a lot of information, including this. – Intercalation

git remote get-url origin --push works fine, apparently not depreciated and provides nice brief info (git remote show origin can be very verbose) q.v. git help remote. – Cybill

Answer 1

To obtain only the remote URL:

git config --get remote.origin.url

If you require full output, and you are on a network that can reach the remote repo where the origin resides:

git remote show origin

When using git clone (from GitHub, or any source repository for that matter) the default name for the source of the clone is "origin". Using git remote show will display the information about this remote name. The first few lines should show:

C:\Users\jaredpar\VsVim> git remote show origin
* remote origin
  Fetch URL: [email protected]:jaredpar/VsVim.git
  Push  URL: [email protected]:jaredpar/VsVim.git
  HEAD branch: master
  Remote branches:

If you want to use the value in a script, you would use the first command listed in this answer.

Funderburk

Use git config as described below instead if using jgit with amazon-s3. – Virgilio

Although not relevant to the purpose of the original question, please note that if attempting to get the "Push URL" and multiple URLs are entered for the remote specified, you'll either need to use git remote show origin (optionally with the -n flag provided by @Casey), or with git remote -v as suggested by @Montaro and @rodel. – Doeskin

What file is this written to? I thought the .gitconfig file would have it, but I didn't see it in mine. – Jitney

@Jitney ´~/.gitconfig is global to all git repositories, this here comes from the local config which usually is in .git/config (however for git-submodules the answer is a bit more difficult). Note that strace git config --get remote.origin.url is your friend. – Robinson

But the original URL doesn't have to be the URL of the currently used remote. To show the actual used URL, you would need this solution then: https://mcmap.net/q/14249/-find-out-which-remote-branch-a-local-branch-is-tracking – Wernher

Note: the approach git remote show origin doesn't work if the stored credentials do no longer have required access rights to the original repository. In such case, try git remote -v – Scrubby

I removed the phrase "referential integrity" as it is misleading in the context of git. Searching the git docs for the phrase reveals no hits git-scm.com/search/results?search=referential%20integrity The first command works when you are offline and the second works only if you are online. – Fairweather

git config --get remote.origin.url this works for me – Courtly

Also git config --get remote.origin.url will not error out if the directory does not have a initialised repository and instead returns nothing (empty string) – Calen

Shallow copy of git doesn't give any result for this. – Sandy

As mentioned in the @CarlSuster's answer below, use ls-remote instead. This does not work with insteadof properly. – Mayweed

Answer 2

This gives only the URL, which is useful for scripting purposes:

git config --get remote.origin.url

Subsequent

This is the correct answer. It is way faster and it even works, if the remote url is not available anymore (git remote show origin just shows "conq: repository does not exist."). – Cameroun

This is not quite the right answer because of the config option url.<base>.insteadOf. See my answer - git has a command for this purpose. – Emetine

@MateenUlhaq I don't really care in this case, but in general please avoid purely stylistic edits - authors are free to write in their preferred style as long as it's clear. – Subsequent

TO CHANGE THIS, do: git remote set-url origin http://..... OR, look here: [docs.github.com/en/get-started/getting-started-with-git/… for more directions. And, upvote this comment since it's probably what a bunch of people want to do – Judaea

Answer 3

This will print all your remotes' fetch/push URLs:

git remote -v

Gaidano

@Gaidano exactly, without it, only the name of the remote is printed (e.g. origin). – Biomass

Answer 4

To get the answer:

git ls-remote --get-url [REMOTE]

This is better than reading the configuration; refer to the man page for git-ls-remote:

--get-url

Expand the URL of the given remote repository taking into account any "url.<base>.insteadOf" config setting (See git-config(1)) and exit without talking to the remote.

As pointed out by @Jefromi, this option was added in v1.7.5 and not documented until v1.7.12.2 (2012-09).

Emetine

good one : this also would provide the same for previous versions > git remote -v| grep fetch|awk '{print $2}' – Woodenware

I think most of the other answers are more of a show-and-tell about git commands and exposition about git history. This is the only answer that doesn't assume your upstream is called origin. – Fulltime

This is the most direct replacement for the old remote get-url option. It's a drop-in replacement. – Cornie

Answer 5

With Git 2.7 (release January 5th, 2015), you have a more coherent solution using git remote:

git remote get-url origin

(nice pendant of git remote set-url origin <newurl>)

See commit 96f78d3 (16 Sep 2015) by Ben Boeckel (mathstuf).
^{(Merged by Junio C Hamano -- gitster -- in commit e437cbd, 05 Oct 2015)}:

remote: add get-url subcommand

Expanding insteadOf is a part of ls-remote --url and there is no way to expand pushInsteadOf as well.
Add a get-url subcommand to be able to query both as well as a way to get all configured URLs.

get-url:

Retrieves the URLs for a remote.
Configurations for insteadOf and pushInsteadOf are expanded here.
By default, only the first URL is listed.

• With '--push', push URLs are queried rather than fetch URLs.
• With '--all', all URLs for the remote will be listed.

---

Before git 2.7, you had:

 git config --get remote.[REMOTE].url
 git ls-remote --get-url [REMOTE]
 git remote show [REMOTE]

Majolica

Answer 6

To summarize, there are at least four ways:

Trying it out using the official Linux repository:

Least information:

$ git config --get remote.origin.url
https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git

and

$ git ls-remote --get-url
https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git

More information:

$ git remote -v
origin    https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git (fetch)
origin    https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git (push)

Even more information:

$ git remote show origin
* remote origin
  Fetch URL: https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git
  Push  URL: https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git
  HEAD branch: master
  Remote branch:
    master tracked
  Local branch configured for 'git pull':
    master merges with remote master
  Local ref configured for 'git push':
    master pushes to master (up to date)

Teasley

Note git config --get remote.origin.url retrieves the original URL which was set with git remote add ... or git remote set-url ... while git ls-remote --get-url origin retrieves the URL which is actually used to access the remote - which might be different in presence of git config --global url.XXX.insteadOf YYY. So both outputs may differ! Also note that git ls-remote --get-url (without origin) does not neccessarily retrieve origin, instead it shows the tracked upstream, so it will fail for example in detached HEAD state. – Robinson

No longer supported – Minicam

Answer 7

For me, this is the easier way (less typing):

git remote -v

Output:

origin    https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git (fetch)
origin    https://github.com/torvalds/linux.git (push)

Actually, I've that into an alias called s that does:

git remote -v
git status

You can add to your profile with:

alias s='git remote -v && git status'

Patricapatrice

Answer 8

I think you can find it under .git/config and remote["origin"] if you didn't manipulate that.

Sybyl

Answer 9

Short answer:

$ git remote show -n origin

or, an alternative for pure quick scripts:

$ git config --get remote.origin.url

Some info:

1. $ git remote -v will print all remotes (not what you want). You want origin right?
2. $ git remote show origin much better, shows only origin but takes too long (tested on git version 1.8.1.msysgit.1).

I ended up with: $ git remote show -n origin, which seems to be fastest. With -n it will not fetch remote heads (AKA branches). You don't need that type of info, right?

http://www.kernel.org/pub//software/scm/git/docs/git-remote.html

You can apply | grep -i fetch to all three versions to show only the fetch URL.

If you require pure speed, then use:

$ git config --get remote.origin.url

Thanks to @Jefromi for pointing that out.

Arthro

Answer 10

The Git URL will be inside the Git configuration file. The value corresponds to the key url.

For Mac and Linux, use the commands below:

awk '/url/{print $3}' project_dir/.git/config

For Windows, open the below file in any text editor and find the value for key url.

project_dir/.git/config

Note: This will work even if you are offline or the remote Git server has been taken down.

Chantilly

This is what worked for me once the remote server that hosted the original checkout was taken down. All the other attempts failed: git remote get-url origin >> fatal: No such remote 'origin', git config --get remote.origin.url >> – Generation

Answer 11

I can never remember all the parameters to Git commands, so I just put an alias in the ~/.gitconfig file that makes more sense to me, so I can remember it, and it results in less typing:

[alias]
url = ls-remote --get-url

After reloading the terminal, you can then just type:

> git url

Here are a few more of my frequently used ones:

[alias]
cd = checkout
ls = branch
lsr = branch --remote
lst = describe --tags

I also highly recommend git-extras which has a git info command which provides much more detailed information on the remote and local branches.

Pie

Nice aliases, I love how they meld very naturally with bash commands. I can see this being causing the least amount of mental friction when switching between bash and git. Bravo! – Massproduce

Answer 12

I prefer this one as it is easier to remember:

git config -l

It will list all useful information such as:

user.name=Your Name
[email protected]
core.autocrlf=input
core.repositoryformatversion=0
core.filemode=true
core.bare=false
core.logallrefupdates=true
remote.origin.url=https://github.com/mapstruct/mapstruct-examples
remote.origin.fetch=+refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
branch.master.remote=origin
branch.master.merge=refs/heads/master

Ouabain

Answer 13

I basically use:

git remote get-url origin

It works for Git Bash command console or CMD command console in Windows. That said, it works with version 2.x of Git.

Recurve

Answer 14

The upstream's remote may not be called "origin", so here's a variation:

remote=$(git config --get branch.master.remote)
url=$(git config --get remote.$remote.url)
basename=$(basename "$url" .git)
echo $basename

Or:

basename $(git config --get remote.$(git config --get branch.master.remote).url) .git

For more useful variables there's:

$ git config -l

Prier

Answer 15

git config --list

This command will give all information related to your repository.

Darryl

Answer 16

A simple way is to open the .git/config file:

cat .git/config

To edit:

vim .git/config or

nano .git/config

Parfait

This presumes you are on Linux(?). – Doubleness

Answer 17

You cloned your repository with SSH clone.

git config --get remote.origin.url
[email protected]:company/product/production.git

But you want to get an HTTP URL to open it in the browser or share it:

git config --get remote.origin.url | sed -e 's/:/\//g'| sed -e 's/ssh\/\/\///g'| sed -e 's/git@/https:\/\//g'

https://gitlab.com/company/product/production.git

GitHub or GitLab doesn’t matter.

Alastair

Useful! Doesn't work on https urls though. This one is universal, works for both git@... and https://...: git config --get remote.origin.url | sed -E 's/:([^\/])/\/\1/g' | sed -e 's/ssh\/\/\///g' | sed -e 's/git@/https:\/\//g' – Dunstan

I modified it to support HTTPS, SSH and remove the .git suffix from the URL: git config --get remote.origin.url | sed -E 's/git@(.*?)\:/http:\/\/\1/;s/\.git$//' – Piercy

Answer 18

Print arbitrarily named remote fetch URLs:

git remote -v | grep fetch | awk '{print $2}'

Applegate

Answer 19

To get the IP address/hostname of origin

For ssh:// repositories:

git ls-remote --get-url origin | cut -f 2 -d @ | cut -f 1 -d "/"

For git:// repositories:

git ls-remote --get-url origin | cut -f 2 -d @ | cut -f 1 -d ":"

Prorogue

For ssh this only works in absence of ~/.ssh/config which rewrites the hostname or alias. – Robinson

Answer 20

To supplement the other answers: If the remote has for some reason been changed and so doesn't reflect the original origin, the very first entry in the reflog (i.e. the last entry displayed by the command git reflog) should indicate where the repo was originally cloned from.

e.g.

$ git reflog | tail -n 1
f34be46 HEAD@{0}: clone: from https://github.com/git/git
$

(Bear in mind that the reflog may be purged, so this isn't guaranteed to work.)

Haddington

Answer 21

With git remote show origin you have to be in the projects directory. But if you want to determine the URLs from anywhere else you could use:

cat <path2project>/.git/config | grep url

If you'll need this command often, you could define an alias in your .bashrc or .bash_profile with MacOS.

alias giturl='cat ./.git/config | grep url'

So you just need to call giturl in the Git root folder in order to simply obtain its URL.

---

If you extend this alias like this

alias giturl='cat .git/config | grep -i url | cut -d'=' -f 2'

you get only the plain URL without the preceding

"url="

in

url=http://example.com/repo.git

you get more possibilities in its usage:

Example

On Mac you could call open $(giturl) to open the URL in the standard browser.

Or chrome $(giturl) to open it with the Chrome browser on Linux.

Disturbance

Answer 22

If you do not know the name of the upstream remote for a branch, you can look that up first by inspecting the upstream branch name that the current branch was built upon. Use git rev-parse like this:

git rev-parse --symbolic-full-name --abbrev-ref @{upstream}

This shows that upstream branch that was the source for the current branch. This can be parsed to get the remote name like this:

git rev-parse --symbolic-full-name --abbrev-ref @{upstream} | cut -d / -f 1

Now take that and pipe it to git ls-remote and you'll get the URL of the upstream remote that is the source of the current branch:

git ls-remote --get-url \
  $(git rev-parse --symbolic-full-name --abbrev-ref @{upstream} | cut -d / -f 1)

Now it should be noted, that this is not necessarily the same as the source remote repository that was cloned from. In many cases however it will be enough.

Vanadium

Answer 23

#!/bin/bash

git-remote-url() {
 local rmt=$1; shift || { printf "Usage: git-remote-url [REMOTE]\n" >&2; return 1; }
 local url

 if ! git config --get remote.${rmt}.url &>/dev/null; then
  printf "%s\n" "Error: not a valid remote name" && return 1
  # Verify remote using 'git remote -v' command
 fi

 url=`git config --get remote.${rmt}.url`

 # Parse remote if local clone used SSH checkout
 [[ "$url" == git@* ]] \
 && { url="https://github.com/${url##*:}" >&2; }; \
 { url="${url%%.git}" >&2; };

 printf "%s\n" "$url"
}

Usage:

# Either launch a new terminal and copy `git-remote-url` into the current shell process, 
# or create a shell script and add it to the PATH to enable command invocation with bash.

# Create a local clone of your repo with SSH, or HTTPS
git clone [email protected]:your-username/your-repository.git
cd your-repository

git-remote-url origin

Output:

https://github.com/your-username/your-repository

Jesusitajet

Answer 24

To get only the remote URL:

git config --get remote.origin.url

In order to get more details about a particular remote, use the

git remote show [remote-name] command

To see the remote URL:

git remote show origin

To see where you .git folder placed:

git config --get remote.origin.url

Receivable

Answer 25

alias git-repo="git config --get remote.origin.url | sed -e 's/:/\//g'| sed -e 's/ssh\/\/\///g'| sed -e 's/git@/https:\/\//g'"
alias git-pr="git config --get remote.origin.url | sed -e 's/:/\//g'| sed -e 's/ssh\/\/\///g'| sed -e 's/git@/https:\/\//g' | sed 's/....$//' | sed -ne 's/$/\/pulls &/p'"

Add this expression to the .zshrc or .bashrc file in the main directory.

After that, you can use like

git-repo
git-pr

Stoeber

Answer 26

My favorite is this (only works for public repositories).

1. Check the pattern

2. Check that a web request returns a valid GitHub repository.

   import re
   import requests
   
   def is_github_repo(url):
       pattern = re.compile(r'^https://github\.com/[^/]+/[^/]+$')
       if not pattern.match(url):
           return False
       response = requests.head(url)
       return response.status_code == 200 and \
              response.headers['Content-Type'].startswith('text/html')
   
   url = 'https://github.com/username/repo-name'
   if is_github_repo(url):
       print(f'{url} is a GitHub repository.')
   else:
       print(f'{url} is not a GitHub repository.')
   

Transmit

Note: In the interactive Python shell, the empty line in the middle of function is_github_repo() will result in IndentationError: unexpected indent – Doubleness