What Is a Branch?

Why are branches useful?

Let’s say you are working on a project with a team. You’ve been working on a significant feature that requires a lot of changes to the codebase, and, all of a sudden, one of your team members tells you that there is a major bug, and you need to prioritize it and fix it.

You will find yourself in a confusing situation. Not only will you need to switch context completely by focusing on the new issue at hand, but where will you store all the code you have been working on for the unfinished feature? The bug has nothing to do with the unfinished feature. Fixing the bug along with the feature is going to create a lot of confusion for everyone.

You will somehow need to go back to a state or snapshot of the source code before you started making changes to it for the feature, fix the bug, and then go back to work from where you had left off. This scenario is precisely where Git branches can work in your favor.

Branches in Git

In Git, you start with the one, primary branch called the master. This name is the default, given to the branch the moment you create your very first commit.

All the other commits you make from that point on are made on the master branch. Git, however, allows you to create as many other branches as you like.