Git - how to revert multiple recent commits

Let's assume we have a history like this:

G1 - G2 - G3 - B1 - B2 - B3

Where G1-G3 are 'good' commits and B1-B3 are 'bad' commits and we want to revert them. If changes are not pushed to the server yet then the easy way is to reset the state to previous commit with git reset --hard HEAD~3. Here we can refer to B3 as HEAD, B2 is HEAD~1, B3 is HEAD~2. This way the last good commit G3 is HEAD~3.

But if changes are pushed it is better to use revert. And here is how to do this for multiple commits:

$ git revert --no-commit HEAD~2^..HEAD

Or:

$ git revert --no-commit HEAD~3..HEAD

We need to revert a range of revisions from B1 to B3. Range specified with two dots like .. includes only commits reachable from , but not reachable from (see man gitrevisions). Since we need to include B3 (represented by HEAD~2) we use HEAD~2^ (its parent) or HEAD~3 (also parent of HEAD~2). The HEAD~2^ syntax is more convenient if commit SHAs are used to name commits.

The --no-commit option tells git to do the revert, but do not commit it automatically. So now we can review the repository state and commit it. After that we will get the history like this:

G1 - G2 - G3 - B1 - B2 - B3 - R'

Where `R'` is revert commit which will return repository state to the commit `G3`. Run git diff to check this (output should be empty):

$ git diff HEAD~4 HEAD

Another way to run revert is to specify commits one by one from newest to oldest:

$ git revert --no-commit HEAD HEAD~1 HEAD~2

In this case there is no need to specify HEAD~3 since it is a good commit we do not want to revert.

Links

Stackoverflow: Revert multiple git commits Stackoverflow: Revert a range of commits in git Stackoverflow: Git diff .. ? What's the difference between having .. and no dots What's the difference between HEAD^ and HEAD~ in Git?