How to Search for Local and Remote Git Branches in Your Terminal

Sometimes I find myself needing to switch back to an old branch that I can not remember the name of. But I do remember a specific word the branch name contains. So how do I search that branch name. Here is how to do it with git branch piping to grep

Make sure you are on the project directory. And run the below command.

$ git branch -a | grep <word>

For example. If I have tons of branches and I want to list all the branches that includes that word test, we would run the command like this

$ git branch -a | grep test

If you want to do a case-insensetive search you can also pass the -i flag.

$ git branch -a | grep -i TeSt

And it will list out all the avaialble local and remote branches with the word test in it.

the -a flag ensures that all local and remote branches are listed. If you want to list only the local ones just run the the command without the -a flag. And if you want list the remote ones only pass the -r flag instead of the -a flag.

Fore more information check out the man page of git branch

man git branch