Git commit date

Question

Other than parsing git log for the date string, is there a Git native way to report the date of a certain commit?

Good stuff : https://git-scm.com/docs/pretty-formats – Nevin Chen Mar 01 '16 at 05:38 — Nevin Chen, Mar 01 '16 at 05:38

score 352 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 01 '21 at 08:57

352

The show command may be what you want. Try

git show -s --format=%ci <commit>

Other formats for the date string are available as well. Check the manual page for details.

edited Oct 01 '21 at 08:57

srobinson

answered Sep 28 '10 at 16:36

Tim Henigan

23

To get the commit without its diff, use `log -1` instead of `show`. – Josh Lee Sep 28 '10 at 16:42
41

Or add the '-s' to the command: `git show -s --format="%ci" ` – aprock Sep 28 '10 at 17:38
10

For future users: you can view the *author date* with `%ai`. – user541686 Jan 12 '15 at 02:27
@Mehrdad I'm looking to accomplish this with all the files in a `repo git ls-tree -r --name-only HEAD` sent through a loop doesn't give me a specific date-time. – DBS Apr 21 '16 at 22:02
11

to get just unix timestamp: use git show -s --format=%ct – xiaoweiz Oct 20 '16 at 13:37
5

If you want another date format, you can use `git show -s --format=%cd --date=short ` (will give e.g. 2016-11-02) or `git show -s --format=%cd --date=short ` or `git show -s --format=%cd --date=format:%Y ` (this example will print only the year) For details see [this answer](http://stackoverflow.com/a/19742762/935676). – amoebe Nov 02 '16 at 15:53
1

It is _significantly_ faster to use `log -1` rather than `show -s` for large merge commits so I definitely recommend using `log -1` if you are trying to find stale branches. This sped it up from hours to minutes in the case of the monorepo I'm working with right now. – marczych Jul 25 '18 at 01:54
`git show -s --format=%ci` is what I wanted (for most recent commit) – Ryan Feb 06 '20 at 17:20

score 33 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 06 '13 at 12:52

33

If you want to see only the date of a tag you'd do:

git show -s --format=%ci <mytagname>^{commit}

which gives: 2013-11-06 13:22:37 +0100

Or do:

git show -s --format=%ct <mytagname>^{commit}

which gives UNIX timestamp: 1383740557

answered Nov 06 '13 at 12:52

Marcus Philip

This seems to give the date of the commit a tag points to, not the date of the tag its self. – hoijui Oct 22 '21 at 06:20

score 25 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 28 '15 at 11:18

25

If you like to have the timestamp without the timezone but local timezone do

git log -1 --format=%cd --date=local

Which gives this depending on your location

Mon Sep 28 12:07:37 2015

answered Sep 28 '15 at 11:18

schoetbi

Is it possible to apply this for all the commits all in once? – alper Jan 05 '21 at 12:52

score 5 · Answer 4 · answered Nov 11 '20 at 15:32

You can use the git show command.

To get the last commit date from git repository in a long(Unix epoch timestamp):

Note: You can visit the git-show documentation to get a more detailed description of the options.

score 5 · Answer 5 · answered Jul 14 '21 at 12:57

5

In case that you want to format the date (or hour) by yourself:

git show -s --date=format:'%Y%m%d-%H%M' --format=%cd  <commit id | default is the last commit>

# example output:
20210712-1948

answered Jul 14 '21 at 12:57

dsaydon

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Jan 22 '19 at 14:19

if you got troubles with windows cmd command and .bat just escape percents like that

git show -s --format=%%ct

The % character has a special meaning for command line parameters and FOR parameters. To treat a percent as a regular character, double it: %%

6 Answers6