What are the best Git clients for macOS?

Question

31

Options
Considered

1K

User
Recs.

Jul 22, 2021

Last
Updated

Here’s the Deal

The Best 1 of 29 OptionsWhy?

Best Git clients for macOS	Price	Platforms	Pull Request/Comments support
95 The Command Line	-	-	-
88 SmartGit	-	Linux, Mac, Windows	Atlassian Stash, BitBucket, GitHub, own Git server (Distributed Review add-on)
81 Magit	Free	Any supported by Emacs (Linux, Windows,macOS,*BSD...)	-
79 GitKraken	Free	Windows, macOS, Linux	-
77 SourceTree	33	Windows, macOS	-

See Full List

28 Other Options Considered

SmartGit

Top Pro

Easy to use

The clean and intuitive UI makes SmartGit very easy even for people with no prior experience with Git, even after reading just a bit on how Git works and what the main commands are. See More

Top Con

Proprietary license

Not an open source license. See More

Theodoros Antoniou's Experience

I maintain a repo with a lot of submodules and SmartGit simplified my workflow tremendously. Its UI can be intimidating at first, but it's actually quite intuitive and powerful once you get used to it. The log is powerful and allows you to control what branches/remotes to show, as well as show commits that have been deleted (reflog) which comes in handy some times. SmartGit also has a UI for interactive rebases and an even simpler UI if you only care about squashing commits. I use that a lot, as I like to maintain a clean history and remove useless commits. I'd recommend SmartGit to anyone with a complex repo such as using submodules or having a lot of activity (branches, users). If you have a simple repo, there are probably simpler tools that will work for you just as well. (I.e. SmartGit is a chainsaw and you just need a knife). See More

Specs

Platforms:Linux, Mac, Windows

Pull Request/Comments support:Atlassian Stash, BitBucket, GitHub, own Git server (Distributed Review add-on)

Pro Features:Conflict Solver and Compare (freely editable); Pull Requests, Comments for BitBucket, GitHub and provider independent (Distributed Review add-on); Git-Flow; highly configurable views, external tools

Issue Tracker support:Atlassian JIRA

Top Pro

Fully featured

Has really many features like the side-by-side index+HEAD+work tree diff tool integrated as well as a conflict view that really helps. See More

Top Con

Requires non-beginner level of GIT to appreciate fully

ReveredIxtab's Experience

Use it every day. Other options tried were SourceTree and command line - SmartGIT is better. Much better. See More

Top Pro

Side by side comparison

The best side by side comparison in any Git GUI. You can edit and do line by line reverts, something that can be taken for granted and you'd be surprised when other clients don't have these features. The 3-way side by side merge for conflicts is also a breeze. See More

Top Con

Unintuitive UI

At first glance, the sub windows are poorly organized. For example, there isn't an easy way to navigate the files in the repository. It's drastically differently designed than other popular source control clients. See More

MeticulousOxomoco's Experience

nice and very intuitive client for git-client See More

Top Pro

Has a conflict solver tool included

It doesn't require an external merge tool (like Sourcetree). This is very useful and works better than other tools, and also is cross platform. See More

Top Con

Very expensive and no multi-user licences

91 EUR per year per person for the base version is more expensive than top development IDEs, and is exaggerated. No multi-user and no site licence either, which makes the licence management a pain. See More

HelpfulChaxiraxi's Experience

Full functionality AND ergonomic use. See More

Top Pro

Great commit tree in log

Allows powerful navigation between branches and eases merges. See More

Top Con

It can be slow and resource hungry

It was written in Java, which is known for being a resource hog, and it can be slow on some machines, as well as prone to errors if developers are not very experienced. See More

JoyfulMedusa's Experience

Great work... Thanks :) See More

Top Pro

Smart embedded difference viewer

When the changes affect only a few characters in a line of code, the embedded difference viewers in the majority of competitors (such as SourceTree) show the whole line as removed and re-added. SmartGit highlights the characters that have been removed / added, so they are easier to read. See More

Top Con

Currently lacks support for git subtree

It's a useful feature when developing several independent project modules in parallel. See More

DiplomaticByggvir's Experience

I'm using SmartGit since 2009 an have very good experience with it. I learned how to use git and what it can do with SmartGit. I managed big projects with it, and it worked fine. I even managed projects that had been hosted and different CMSystems like SVN, CSV and CA-Harvest. Development was done in git, releasing in SVN and Harvest, SmartGit helped a lot to solve conflicts between the different systems source changes. The only negative point is if the project is very big 4mio. code lines + then it get very slow and it runnes out of memory and hangs. But after a reboot is all fine again. See More

Top Pro

Excellent support and regular updates and improvements

Developers are very pro-active and respond very quickly to any email inquiry. See More

Top Con

Absolute git beginners will find it very complicated

Top Pro

Lets you see what the command-line would be

When using one of the buttons, the log shows you the command that is actually used. Helps to understand and learn command-line git! See More

Top Con

Slow & sluggish sometimes

Specifically, when you come back to the program, you need to give it a few seconds to make sure it has the correct updates that you've been working on. In the same vein, when you commit, it takes a bit to refresh back to clean working tree. See More

Top Pro

Can detect and even pull changes from remote repos automatically

This is available through the "Favorite" flag one can set for each repository. See More

Top Con

Some git functionality has been renamed

In order to preserve the same interface across Git and Mercurial, some naming compromises have been made. See More

Top Pro

Great commit tree (graph) in log

The graph visualisation in the log is superb and allows you to easily navigate between branches, see commits in context and even view "lost heads" (reflog) in the Recyclable Comits. See More

Top Pro

Uncluttered UI

SmartGit has a rather clean and uncluttered user interface. All the most useful tools and information are displayed at all times or are otherwise just a couple of clicks away. All repositories are displayed in the sidebar and through a tabbed interface you can view various info about a specific repository (files, branches, branch graph, etc). The most used git commands like pull, push, sync, commit and merge are always available on top. See More

Top Pro

Available for Windows and Linux as well, with the same interface

Top Pro

Can be integrated with Github, Bitbucket, and Atlassian Stash

Using OAuth, you can connect SmartGit with your accounts in Github, Bitbucket, or Stash and access the remote repositories there. You can then clone, fork, commit or push to your remote repositories from inside SmartGit. You can also view and manage pull requests for your open source projects from SmartGit. See More

Top Pro

Git-flow support

Git-flow provides a consistent development process by defining a strict branching model that is great for managing large projects. SmartGit/Hg allows setting up and integrating into repos that follow this model. See More

Top Pro

Portable version for Windows is available

SmartGit also has a portable bundle that can be downloaded and can be run from external devices (such as a flash drive for example). See More

Top Pro

The best multi-repository support

Can make a repo group containing multiple repos; it acts as a meta repo. Can submit selected files from multiple repos in a repo group in one commit action; uses the same commit message in all the repo commits. See More

Top Pro

Drag-and-drop support

Easy to merge/rebase/reset/fast-forward/cherry-pick right within log window by simply drag-and-dropping head markers. See More

Top Pro

Support Git, Mercurial and SVN

SmartGit/Hg supports Git and Mercurial as well as SVN via git bridge. See More

Top Pro

Best submodule workflow on the market

You can easily update submodules from the containing repo, unlike other GUIs that require you to open each repo separately. Saves a lot of time when working on a monorepo managed using submodules. See More

Top Pro

Free for non-commercial use

SmartGit can be used free of charge by Open Source developers, teachers and their students, or for hobby, non-paid usage. See More

Top Pro

Same license works on OS X, Linux and Windows

Top Pro

Every git command is available through the GUI

Not every, but nearly all. See More

Top Pro

Log: ability to see dangling commits and stash commits

Rebased, but not yet garbage-collected commits can be easily made accessible again, e.g. after a reset hard. See More

Top Pro

Built-in encrypted master password vault

Stores all your different repository passwords within an encrypted vault that can be activated with a single master password. See More

Top Pro

Has the most features and most logical layout

Compared to gitk, git gui, SourceTree, GitKraken. See More

Top Pro

Allows rearranging views

If screen space is limited, one can stack some views onto another. 2 layouts are available - "Main" and "Review" - with independent view positions. See More

Top Pro

Journal dedicated for current branch history

Showing commits from the current branch, its remote branch and one auxiliary branch. Independent of the that, there is a log window available that allows to view all (other) commits. See More

Top Pro

Great overview of the project/repository's log

SmartGit's log viewer displays the full commit history in a clean UI. This can be filtered to only show commits matching a certain criterion (e.g. branch). See More

Top Pro

Extendable with external tools

External tools (which have a command line support) can be integrated to be used to open/view files, for diff or as conflict solvers. E.g. editors like Notepad++ or VS Code, p4merge to diff images or kdiff3 as diff view/conflict solver. See More

Top Pro

Auto stash

If normal Git commands would abort because of local modifications, SmartGit can stash them and apply later after the command ran successfully, e.g. a rebase. See More

Top Pro

Great support

Support responds quickly and they genuinely try to help you! If it's a bug, it will often be fixed within days. See More

Top Pro

Offers life-time updates

One payment, get updates for all future versions. See More

Top Pro

Syntax coloring for many languages

The built-in compare and conflict solver has syntax coloring with customizable colors. See More

Top Pro

Supports GitFlow

GitFlow provides a consistent development process by defining a strict branching model that is great for managing large projects. SmartGit allows for setting up and integrating into repos that follow this model. See More

Top Pro

Evolution submission program

See http://smartgit.userecho.com/ See More

Top Pro

Can detect issue numbers and links to the issue tracker

Support GitBugTraq file : https://github.com/mstrap/bugtraq See More

Top Pro

Great filtering options

The file list view can be tweaked and filtered in many ways (e.g. regex can be used). See More

Top Pro

Auto-detects repositories on disk

You don't have to search all the repositories when trying out SmartGit the 1st time, but it finds all of them magically. See More

Top Pro

Log with fine-grained display of branches

There is no option of just showing the current branch or all branches, but you can select very fine-grained what branches/forks should be displayed. See More

Top Pro

Excellent dark theme

And support for own themes. See More

Top Pro

Supports selecting open issues from JIRA

Allows you to select the desired issue, instead of having to do it manually. See More

Top Pro

Supports Mercurial & SVN

Apart from Git, SmartGit supports both Mercurial and SVN via a git bridge. See More

Top Pro

Free for non-commercial use (with some restrictions)

SmartGit can be used free of charge by Open Source developers, teachers and their students, or for hobby, non-paid usage. However, some features are only available with paid versions, like JIRA/GitHub Entreprise/Bitbucket integration, distributed review, DeepGit. See More

Top Pro

Cross-platform

Top Pro

Can edit file in workspace or index directly from the compare view

This is very useful when reviewing files before committing and finding a needed quick tweak. See More

Top Pro

Can rearrange Repository window and Log window views/panels

This allows great layouts as desired. See More

Top Pro

GPG support

GPG in SmartGit makes for added security. See More

See All

Magit

Top Pro

Uninterrupted workflow for common tasks

Simple tasks, such as commits, can quickly be made without leaving the editor. See More

Top Con

Useful only for people who use Emacs

Magit is only useful if your text editor of choice is Emacs. It wouldn't really make any sense to open up emacs just to run Magit if you use another editor. See More

Specs

Platforms:Any supported by Emacs (Linux, Windows,macOS,*BSD...)

License:GPLv3

Top Pro

Diffs are easy

Since it's integrated with Emacs, diffs are very easy to fix. You can jump right to any file you want to fix as soon as it comes up in the logs or in the status view. See More

Top Pro

Easy to remember mnemonics

You can easily learn the mnemonics for the most common tasks and use them to your advantage to speed up your workflow. See More

Top Pro

Better visualization and interactive workflow

Top Pro

Stage hunks or even just parts of a hunk using a single key press

In Magit staging a hunk or even just part of a hunk is very easy. Magit also implements several other "apply variants" in addition to staging and unstaging. For example: you can also discard or reverse a change, or apply it to the working tree. See More

Top Pro

Blame information can be viewed inline with the file

Top Pro

Multiple buffers are used to show contextual information

Top Pro

Powerful rebasing

Top Pro

Detailed documentation

Magit comes with a very detailed manual. And the manual has just been rewritten from scratch - Magit is now probably the candidate with the most extensive documentation, second only to Git itself. See More

Top Pro

Available in Homebrew

brew install magit See More

See All

GitKraken

Top Pro

Beautiful user interface

It's modern and beautiful, it looks clean and refined. It's simple: the most used features (pull, push, branch, stash, commit) are accessible in one click, and are the only buttons. The other features aren't in complicated menus nor in hundreds of buttons, but rather displayed when you right-click on something. It gives more space to the commits, i.e. the most important things. In fact, you can collapse or reduce the other menus/windows. It displays the current path (project, branch) on an horizontal (clickable) bar at the top. It's just a matter of taste but I prefer this to the traditional "tree" view. It has undo and redo buttons on the main window. It supports some drag-and-drop gestures (for example: drag-and-droping the local branch to the remote one pushes it). See More

Top Con

Not open source

It is free but is not open source. See More

WittyChalchiuhtlicue's Experience

I've used GitKraken at my daily job and also in my personal projects See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS, Linux

Integrations:GitHub, Bitbucket, GitLab, Azure DevOps, GitHub Enterprise, GitLab Self-Hosted, Bitbucket Server, Jira Cloud/Server Issues, GitKraken Boards Issues

Top Pro

Extremely easy to use

A lot of care has gone into trying to make GitKraken as easy and intuitive as possible and it show. Every action is quick and painless with no more user interaction than necessary. For example, switching to another branch is as easy as a double-click on the sidebar. See More

Top Con

Not free for commercial use

The free version of GitKraken cannot be used in commercial projects. See More

Davide Imola's Experience

Love the way in how you can handle different Git profile easly! See More

Top Pro

Free version available

There are both pro and free versions available. The free version is pretty complete feature-wise for day-to-day operations. See More

Top Con

Has memory-related issues

Like most Electron apps, GitKraken has some memory-related issues. For starter, it requires more memory for an action than an equivalent non-Electron application. Although this should not be a problem most of the time for people who use machines with lots of RAM (after all, RAM is pretty cheap nowadays), it can have some issues when opening large repositories and there have been cases where GitKraken failed to open very large repositories or started lagging once they were opened. See More

ReflectiveFulgora's Experience

GitKraken is visually pleasing and streamlined with features that really make your life simpler. My favorite part about it is how simple it is to pull, push, and clone git repos with a simple click. See More

Top Pro

Offers a simple way of undoing mistakes

GitKraken has simple undo/redo buttons that work the same way you'd expect in any other software. See More

Top Con

Slow

Isaac Hake's Experience

Stable and has all almost every feature you could want built in--including the best merge tool I've seen. Only things it's lacking that I've noticed are a way to browse all files from within a given commit without checking it out (not really that necessary) and the ability to use git patches without resorting to the CLI. It has a very intuitive and beautiful interface. See More

Top Pro

Excellent integration of commit tree and diff view

Not only is the diff integrated with the commit tree, but it will show a combined diff, if multiple commits are selected. See More

Top Con

Has annoying popup reminders that ask you to upgrade to the Pro version

Understandable, since nobody is entitled to use work done by others for free, but annoying nonetheless. See More

Devpro's Experience

I have used many git client and by far the one with best UX and features is GitKraken, wouldn't do IT without it! See More

Top Pro

Cross-platform

Built on top of Electron, so it runs on Linux, Mac, and Windows. See More

Top Con

Can't expand tags when multiple tags at the same commit.

The first 2 tags you can hover over, but where GitKraken shows you a simple box that says "+2" you can't reveal what those 2 are. See More

Mauricio Flores Hernandez's Experience

At least one year using GitKraken, now i can't live without it. It's the best tool ever. See More

Top Pro

Easy to stash changes and switch branches

It stashes changed and untracked files in order to make it painless to work on more than one branch. See More

Top Con

Crashes once in a while

Under specific circumstances, like resetting 5000+ changes, the GUI will crash. See More

LaterTater's Experience

I've used many Git GUIs in my development career: Source Tree, GitHub Desktop, Smart Git, Tower, the list goes on. GitKraken seems to be the one tool I keep coming back to. The interface is beautiful, the functionality is constantly evolving, and it's easy to learn, making whole team adoption a breeze. See More

Top Pro

Under constant improvement

A quick glance at GitKraken's release notes shows how frequently it's updated. Updates are released on a 2-4 week cycle and each one brings new features and bug fixes. See More

Top Con

Can be confusing

FlexibleElegua's Experience

It's complete, easy to use, have many features and also have a Board to menage project. For me is the most complete Git Client. See More

Top Pro

Perfect for beginner developers

GitKraken is easy to use and is brilliant for the beginner developers See More

Top Con

Ugly interface

Looks like a Windows port. See More

EarnestSamshinHalmoni's Experience

Very slow to use, lots of clicking and some git functionality is missing (such as choosing which files to stash) See More

Top Pro

GitFlow support out of the box

Supports GitFlow out of the box. See More

Top Con

Must log into GitKraken servers to use the free version

All functionality is disabled unless you register for a free account and remain logged in. There is the $79/user/yr Enterprise option. It allows you to deploy a Linux License Server in an air-gapped/offline environment. Endi Sukaj See More

Top Pro

Some of the best integration with hosted version control services

GitKraken can be connected to Github, Gitlab, or Bitbucket accounts through OAuth. From that point onward most if not all actions that are related to these services can be done inside GitKraken. Things like: cloning or forking a repository, adding a remote, pushing to a remote repository hosted on these services can be done inside the app. You can even manage pull requests inside GitKraken for example. All pull requests for a certain branch for example are shown on that branch's graph. See More

Top Con

Free version doesn’t support private Bitbucket repos

Top Pro

Has a FuzzyFinder

GitKraken has a fuzzy finder to switch between repos / files See More

Top Pro

Pull Requests Management

You can create pull requests and view existing ones from within the client. See More

Top Pro

Has a dark theme

No more eyestrain staring at white screens - GitKraken has a lovely dark theme. See More

Top Pro

Quick adoption

Easily use this tool when teaching Git concepts. Helps beginners (and advanced users!) visualize the hard to understand aspects of Git through their network graph. See More

Top Pro

Handle different Git profiles

Top Pro

Good keyboard shortcuts

See All

SourceTree

Top Pro

Free

Free to use without registration. After 30 days, it requires registration (which is also free). See More

Top Con

Slow with large repos or quick operations

Some operations can be slow. If you know what you want (e.g you want to touch a file, add it, commit it and push it) you can do it much faster on the command line. Often you're not going to know what you want, so the visual diffs etc help massively. See More

PatientNulgupjisin's Experience

I use it daily for 99.99% of my git tasks. Impossible to mess up a Gitflow pattern: a couple clicks vs numerous commands. Sweet, safe, fast and efficient. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS

Price:Free

Top Pro

Built-in Git-flow and Hg-flow support

Git-flow and Hg-flow provide a consistent development process by defining a strict branching model that is great for managing large projects. Sourcetree allows setting up and integrating into repos that follow this model. Clicking the Git-flow / Hg-flow toolbar button will give you access to actions for starting or finishing features, releases or hotfixes depending on current state of repository. See More

Top Con

Account registration needed

You have to register a full Atlassian account to use SourceTree. See More

EncouragingHayk's Experience

Each time update corp password the auth fails in source tree. It does not prompt for new password. See More

Top Pro

Informative branch visualisation

In addition to color-coded branches and icons that tell if a file has been added, removed or modified, Sourcetree also displays the number of commits that are ahead and behind remote repo. See More

Top Con

Diffs can be hit and miss

The in-built diff tool doesn't always work that well, meaning you have to resort to external diff tools. See More

JollyVejovis's Experience

It is free and very user friendly UI. It has a lot of features like pull, push, merge, diff etc.. See More

Top Pro

Comprehensive layout

SourceTree has 3 main repository views: file status, history and search. File status view shows status of currently selected repo. It's split in 2 areas - file list and diff-view. History view tracks changes made to the currently selected repository. It's divided in 3 sections. The top section has a graph with progression of commits, branches and merges. The bottom section shows commit details, files changed and differences committed. Search view allows looking up commit messages, users, files changes, branches and commit SHA. There's also a toolbar at the top that allows switching between the three views as well as gives access to git commands such as commit, checkout, reset, stash, add, remove, fetch, pull, push, branch, merge and tag. See More

Top Con

Crashes frequently

Stops responding every 5 minutes. See More

Top Pro

Easy to stage partial changes

Staging only several changed lines while leaving others unstaged is implemented a lot better in SourceTree than everywhere else. Just click in the change view, drag and stage. See More

Top Con

Always slow

Top Pro

Quick setup

Once installed, Sourcetree will automatically try to look for and set up repos that are worked on. Sourcetree will also detect if git-flow is used and what is the current development state as long as default git-flow branch names are used. The softaware tracks all relevant repositories in the bookmark's window. Repositories can be added to the list by creating new ones, adding a local folder, supplying a clone URL or integrating with remote services such as Bitbucket or GitHub. Additionally, it can be set up via Homebrew Cask. Homebrew Cask extends the functionality of Homebrew package manager and allows installing SourceTree with a single line. brew cask install sourcetree See More

Top Con

Information density can be a bit much

It's possible to be overwhelmed with the information density presented in Sourcetree. Especially in history view since it includes a lot of data presented in various ways. It's great for getting a comprehensive overview of everything that's happening in one place, but it can take some getting used. See More

Top Pro

Built-in integration with Stash and Bitbucket

Sourcetree integrates with repositories hosted on Bitbucket, Stash, GitHub and Kiln. See More

Top Con

Doesn't show Tree view for history

Top Pro

Simple yet powerful

SourceTree allows you to do advanced Git operations while making them straight-forward for those who are still adjusting to Git. See More

Top Con

Chews CPU

Top Pro

Consistent UI across platforms

SourceTree is great for working in a cross-platform environment as it has the exact same UI on Windows as it has on OS X. See More

Top Con

No dark theme

No dark theme for Windows, however MacOS version does have a dark theme. See More

Top Pro

Supports Git, Mercurial and Subversion

Allows managing Git & Mercurial repos side by side. It even allows Subversion interoperability via either git-svn or hgsubversion plugins that set up a bridge between either Git and SVN or Mercurial and SVN respectively. See More

Top Con

Changes the global git configuration on install

When you install SourceTree, it will update your global git configuration without prompting to add itself as a difftool. See More

Top Pro

Has git LFS support

Makes working with large files easier See More

Top Con

Numerous bugs in Mac OSX 10.11 El Captain that seem unattended to

Unfortunately, there are numerous bugs and issues that remain in Sourcetree despite the reports from users and developers. See More

Top Pro

Allows the raw git commands and responses to be inspected

If you get into trouble or are curious you can hit the button in the bottom left to show the raw git commands and responses that were executed and when they were executed, although these commands have a bunch of boilerplate which will reduce the usefulness of this feature for most users: eg: git fetch is actually executed as git -c diff.mnemonicprefix=false -c core.quotepath=false -c credential.helper=sourcetree fetch --prune origin See More

Top Con

Removes user from understanding of how Git functions

Top Pro

Informative branch visualization

In addition to color-coded branches and icons that tell if a file has been added, removed or modified, SourceTree also displays the number of commits that are ahead and behind the remote branch. See More

Top Con

No auto stash

Top Pro

Allows chunks and lines selection during commit

SourceTree automatically splits the changes to be committed into chunks allowing committing (or discarding) each chunk separately. Furthermore, the user can even select specific lines. This greatly increases the flexibility of the user in that matter. See More

See All

Fork

Top Pro

Fast and easy to use

Top Con

Still a young client, thus not as feature rich

This git GUI client is quite young compared to industry old-timers like git-tower 2 or SourceTree. So it's not as feature rich as you'd like. Still a very capable client for a simple day-to-day work. See More

PerfectUaIldak's Experience

Smooth, fast, obvious. Love source display of prior commits. No more stash and checkout. Great diff display. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS

Price:FREE / $49.99

Top Pro

Dark theme support

Top Con

No Linux version

This git client is not compatible with Linux making the life harder for the developers that work on both, MacOS and some Linux distro. See More

MagicalAtaegina's Experience

When I tried to sign into Github, it will only let me proceed if I authorize DanPristupov, a developer of Fork, to my projects. That seems unnecessary... can't it just log me in with my username and password and not authorize another user to my stuff? See More

Top Pro

Comfortable when staging line-by-line changes

This feature is superior to the one that is implemented by SourceTree as it does not reset the file scroll view to the top of the file after each stage. If you do feature-specific commits after some time of development - it's very important to be able to easily compose the commit from different line-based changes. See More

Top Con

Requires granting access to your git projects for the developer of the app

Fingermouse's Experience

Very happy with Fork. Have used several other Git GUIs and switched from Tower once they moved to subscription pricing. It's regularly updated, looks good and is quick and easy to use. It's currently free, although I'd be happy to pay to support development. See More

Top Pro

Highlights the difference within a line

ImaginativeTemazcalteci's Experience

I was looking for a git GUI interface for MacOS after working in Windows and Linux using GitExtensions. This seems to be close to feature parity, with the same basic layout arrangement being possible with a little configuration. I haven't had a chance to inspect any extensions for this, but, I'm going to install it on my Windows computer also. I wish there was a Linux version. (I work with the command line a great deal. But, when it comes to inspecting change, and reviewing the merge history in an intuitive way, this is a great tool). See More

Top Pro

Merge Conflict Resolution is great

Top Pro

Smart Diff is very handy

Top Pro

Overall aesthetic

The GUI components are flawless on the Mac. It is expected to be a similar experience on Windows. Once you realize that you can filter by branch, your appreciation for the product will go up dramatically. See More

Top Pro

Comfortable keyboard shortcuts

Top Pro

Tabbed interface

Several repos can be open at once in individual tabs, so it's trivial to switch back and forth between them. See More

Top Pro

Repositories with uncommitted changes have a * next to their name

This is an update from previous versions. See More

See All

tig

Top Pro

Allows you to stay in the terminal

If you prefer to do most of your development inside the terminal, changing windows to move to a GUI git client can be annoying. Since tig runs inside the terminal, that's avoided. See More

Top Con

Steeper barrier to entry as compared to a GUI solution

Since you have to get used to working in the terminal (if you are not already used to doing that) and learn the commands, it has a steeper learning curve than GUI clients which are usually more intuitive and easier to grasp. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac

Technology:C

Top Pro

Fast

Top Pro

Vim-like bindings

Top Pro

Available in Homebrew

Can easily be installed with homebrew simply by running brew install tig See More

Top Pro

Works on any platform

See All

GitX-dev

Top Pro

Visual commit mode

Allows for interactive staging of files or hunks and deleting of unstaged or non-git tracked files. Hunk size slider allows staging/unstaging individual lines, letting you stage pieces of a file easily. See More

Top Con

Clumsy staging workflow

The staging workflow in GitX-dev is kind of clumsy and unintuitive in the opinion of some. (others love it) See More

TranquilCalliope's Experience

The beauty of GitX is that it's a complement of the command line, not a replacement of it. See More

Specs

Platforms:Mac

Top Pro

Fast GUI

Responsive even with thousands of files or large binary like files See More

Top Pro

Understandable trees (branches etc.)

The visualisation of the development trees makes git a lot more useful. The command line is good for a lot, but trees are for GUI clients like GitX. See More

See All

GitUp

Top Pro

Blazing fast

Fast Git GUI. Everything is already there and loaded when you open up the window. See More

Top Con

OS X Only

Only available for OSX, so if you are used to working with different OSes and you want the same tools in each of them, it's impossible to have that with GitUp. See More

Specs

Platforms:Mac

Top Pro

Allows doing complex things without memorizing git

Git usage beyond basic checkout/commit is arcane; GitUp lets you do things in git in seconds that would take you a half hour of research with the command line. See More

Top Con

Font size is not adjustable

Tiny font not good for those with poor vision. See More

Top Pro

Full undo

You can backup, or edit commits, if you make a mistake. See More

Top Pro

Open Source, GPL-licensed

See All

fugitive (via vim)

Top Pro

Great visualization and interactive workflow

The visualization and workflow are great in fugitive. You can do side-by-side or even intra-line diffs all without having to leave your text editor. See More

Top Con

Poor documentation

The documentation is rather poor and not very helpful. See More

Top Pro

Uninterrupted workflow for common tasks

Simple tasks, such as commits, can quickly be made without leaving the editor. See More

Top Pro

Seamlessly "Dive into Diffs" to trace the origin & intent of code

git blame only shows the last change (e.g. a variable rename), but how do you find the origin of the code? :GBlame to open blame window o on the relevant line to "git show" the commit select a diff line from a previous version of the file, and hit o to open it repeat 1 - 3, jumping back through history to find the origin of the line See More

See All

GitHub Desktop

Top Pro

Simple, streamlined GUI

GitHub Desktop uses an extremely simplistic two-panel view. It's not capable of complex historical visualisations like other GUIs, but it is very easy to use (especially for git novices). See More

Top Con

Limited

Can't handle complex tasks. See More

BraveTuonetar's Experience

Works very well for every day git. For mor advanced features, cli can be used. See More

Top Pro

Focused on simplicity

Top Con

Non-GitHub repositories are not fully supported

Since this is mainly a GitHub client, other repositories are not fully supported and with as many features and setting up a repo hosted anywhere else but GitHub is troublesome. See More

Top Pro

Supports pull requests

In addition to being able to seamlessly and easily integrate with all of GitHub's features, it also supports forking and submitting pull requests on any open source project hosted on GitHub. See More

Top Con

Incomplete feature set

Cannot e.g. rebase. See More

Top Pro

Great integration with GitHub services

This is the official GitHub desktop client built by the GitHub team. See More

Top Con

Difficult to understand what a button does unless you click on it

The terminology in GitHub Desktop is often very different than git terminology. It is difficult to predict what some buttons are actually going to do if you click then. See More

Top Pro

Very easy to do pick and choose which changed lines to commit

Helps split changes into small, independent commits See More

Top Con

Forces to use GitHub workflow

Top Con

No Linux version of this client

Top Con

Does not support multiple Remotes for a repo

You can only assign one URL as remote. To manage/sync/fetch other remotes, use command-line Git instead. See More

Top Con

Buggy

Poster child for authors' programming ideology (FRP), likely the cause for the odd quirks and bugs it has. See More

See All

Tower

Top Pro

Native app

Tower is a native app and it shows in terms of UI/UX as well as performance. It feels at home on the Mac. See More

Specs

Platforms:Mac, Windows

Features:Pull Requests, Interactive Rebase, Git-Flow, Dark Mode, Undo, Quick Actions, Image Diffing, Reflog, Drag & Drop, User Profiles

Pricing:FREE, $69/year for Basic, $99/year for Pro, $149/year for Enterprise

Free Version:Yes, for students, teachers, schools, universities, coding bootcamps etc.

See All Specs

Top Pro

Git-flow integration

Top Pro

GPG support

Top Pro

Responsive support

Very responsive support. Willing to help with all Git issues, even if it's not Tower related. See More

See All

GitK

Top Pro

Easy to use

DynamicLeiGong's Experience

Very simple and lightweight, it's enough for me to review branches, do some common actions like revert, reset, cherry pick, rebase, etc. I usually use it along with cli. See More

Top Pro

Free

Gitk is a free and open source tool. It forms part of the official git suite. See More

Top Pro

Fast

Since it's pretty minimalistic and does not contain a lot of features (for example, it can't commit), it's quite fast. See More

Top Pro

Visibly more compact overview output than many other options

When you're using it to scan a long list of changes, you're able to see more of the list without pagination, as there is not this huge buffer of whitespace between each entry. See More

Top Pro

Comes with Git

It's a part of the git package, so no additional application is necessary, and it is developed right alongside git itself. See More

Top Pro

Fast keyboard navigation

No other git client can do fundamental commit & diff navigation via keyboard as well as GitK, GUI or non-GUI, e.g.: Commit View: k, p, UpArrow - go up a commit j, n, DownArrow - go down a commit cmd/ctrl-# - go to (1st, 2nd, ... #th) parent h, z, LeftArrow - go backward in navigation history l, x, RightArrow - go forward in navigation history Tab - (from commit graph) select SHA (for copying) g - go to commit (type or paste SHA or ref) / - focus git log search box cmd/ctrl-g - find next commit ? - find previous commit Diff View: f, b - scroll to next/previous file Space, Delete/Backspace - scroll down/up one page d, u - scroll down/up 18 lines cmd/ctrl-s - search forwards in diff cmd/ctrl-r - search backwards in diff A full list: http://i.imgur.com/LDUgttW.png See More

See All

Aurees

All

1

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS, Linux

Sublime Merge

Top Pro

Fast

This is one the fastest client we've found for switching around them. See More

Top Con

Slim feature set

Top Pro

Actual git commands are visible/editable

Most actions have an option where it will show the actual Git command it's going to run, and you can modify it in place. Very handy if you need to use some obscure option, and also good training for learning command-line operations. See More

Top Con

Dark theme behind paywall

The evaluation version is fully functional, but is restricted to the light theme only. See More

Top Pro

Easy for beginners

This helps to see more complexity and it's very easy to get started with. See More

See All

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The Command Line

Top Pro

The most powerful way to use git

Using CLI gives access to every single git function available. See More

Top Con

Difficult to overview complex project histories

Elias Van Ootegem's Experience

Git is a command line tool, the best way to learn how it works - and how to get the most out of it - is to use it as such. There is a steeper learning curve involved, but once you're used to it, you'll unlock the full power of git. Almost everything is just one or two commands away. The CLI, once mastered, is faster than clicking through nested menus all over the place, no matter how well you know your GUI. See More

Top Pro

Gives a better understanding of how git functions

By using the git from the command line, it's possible to learn how it functions and how to get the desired result. See More

Top Con

Hard to solve complex conflicts

Jahhein's Experience

It's the way it was intended to be used. See More

Top Pro

Available in Homebrew

brew install git See More

Top Con

Recalling is more difficult than recognizing

Although there's autocompletion for commands, it still requires recalling at least the beginning of a command while all that's required using a GUI is recognizing the desired outcome. See More

CourteousVorsa's Experience

Because it's native See More

Top Pro

It's the same across all the platforms

Top Con

Steeper barrier to entry as compared to a GUI solution

Since you have to learn all the different commands and you don't have the visual help that a GUI app gives you, it has a rather steep learning curve. See More

Top Pro

Fast and straightforward

There's no additional layer of abstraction. See More

Top Con

Easy to use improperly

Newer users (not necessarily new developers) can make mistakes more easily which can be time-consuming or costly to fix. See More

Top Pro

Simple

Top Con

Hardest part of the learning curve is the ambiguity of some terms (us/them)

When merging (e.g. git checkout master && git merge my-branch), us refers to master, them is the branch you're merging in. When rebasing (eg git checkout my-branch && git rebase master), us refers to master, them refers to your current working branch. This seems counter-intuitive at first, making it harder to use the CLI to some, but after a while you kind of understand why the terminology is used in this way, and you get used to it. See More

Top Pro

Best community support

Since most devs invoke git via CLI there's a higher chance of getting an answer to a CLI based git problem than a GUI-based. See More

Top Con

Is a badly designed API

Git has awesome architecture but a bad CLI. The meanings of many commands overlap and contradict each other depending on the arguments passed. e.g. Just some: When checkout is used with file path arguments it is a mutative action, changing the working tree but without those arguments it is for passive navigation. reset is just like the mutative behaviour of checkout except it does it for all files. branch requires a flag to create a new branch but tag doesn't to do the same with a tag. https://stevebennett.me/2012/02/24/10-things-i-hate-about-git/ See More

Top Pro

Even a visual representation of various branches and how they're merged is possible

To visualize history: git log --graph See More

Top Pro

Customizable

You can customize it and/or integrate it into automated workflows. It has support for plugins, additional subcommands, and event hooks to perform automated tasks such as updating a bug database or kicking off tests. Additionally, because it is a simple command line program, it is easy to create shell aliases, write scripts that invoke it, or integrate it into a text editor. See More

Top Pro

Gives you full control over what is happening

Any GUI would just use command-line in the background, so by using command-line you are in control. See More

See All

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What are the best Git clients for macOS?

The Best 1 of 29 OptionsWhy?

The Command Line

My Recommendation for The Command Line

My Recommendation for The Command Line

The most powerful way to use git

Difficult to overview complex project histories

Gives a better understanding of how git functions

Hard to solve complex conflicts

Available in Homebrew

Recalling is more difficult than recognizing

It's the same across all the platforms

Steeper barrier to entry as compared to a GUI solution

Fast and straightforward

Easy to use improperly

Simple

Hardest part of the learning curve is the ambiguity of some terms (us/them)

Best community support

Is a badly designed API

Even a visual representation of various branches and how they're merged is possible

Customizable

Gives you full control over what is happening

28 Other Options Considered

SmartGit

My Recommendation for SmartGit

My Recommendation for SmartGit

Easy to use

Proprietary license

Fully featured

Requires non-beginner level of GIT to appreciate fully

Side by side comparison

Unintuitive UI

Has a conflict solver tool included

Very expensive and no multi-user licences

Great commit tree in log

It can be slow and resource hungry

Smart embedded difference viewer

Currently lacks support for git subtree

Excellent support and regular updates and improvements

Absolute git beginners will find it very complicated

Lets you see what the command-line would be

Slow & sluggish sometimes

Can detect and even pull changes from remote repos automatically

Some git functionality has been renamed

Great commit tree (graph) in log

Uncluttered UI

Available for Windows and Linux as well, with the same interface

Can be integrated with Github, Bitbucket, and Atlassian Stash

Git-flow support

Portable version for Windows is available

The best multi-repository support

Drag-and-drop support

Support Git, Mercurial and SVN

Best submodule workflow on the market

Free for non-commercial use

Same license works on OS X, Linux and Windows

Every git command is available through the GUI

Log: ability to see dangling commits and stash commits

Built-in encrypted master password vault

Has the most features and most logical layout

Allows rearranging views

Journal dedicated for current branch history

Great overview of the project/repository's log

Extendable with external tools

Auto stash

Great support

Offers life-time updates

Syntax coloring for many languages

Supports GitFlow

Evolution submission program

Can detect issue numbers and links to the issue tracker

Great filtering options

Auto-detects repositories on disk

Log with fine-grained display of branches

Excellent dark theme

Supports selecting open issues from JIRA

Supports Mercurial & SVN

Free for non-commercial use (with some restrictions)

Cross-platform

Can edit file in workspace or index directly from the compare view