Have you ever found a bug-inducing line change in your code, and wondered who made the change to that line? **Fortunately, git has a command for that**! `git blame` lets you pick a file and show who last changed every line. If you were wondering, it's called `git blame` because it lets you assign blame for the code-breaking line you're investigating.

\
To find out who changed a line, simply run the following command where `myfile.txt` is the file you want to check:

```shell
git blame myfile.txt
```

\
If you're interested in the format of `git blame`, it breaks down like this:

```
^665221a (Johnny Simpson 2022-04-30 20:58:04 +0100  10) import { v4 as uuid } from 'uuid';
^          ^                                         ^
|          |                                         |
Commit ID  |                                     Line number
           |
         Author and timestamp
```

## Using Git Blame on a Particular Line

This is really useful, but what if you want to hone in on a specific line, you can use the `-L` option. For example, if you want to see the change history between lines 1 and 5, you would do the following:

\
```
git blame index.js -L 1,5
```

\
Or, if you wanted to find the change history between lines 20 and 40, you could do the following:

\
```
git blame index.js -L 20,40
```

## Other Useful Git Blame Options

There are also a bunch of other useful `git blame` options that you might want to use. Here are some of the ones I use the most, and what they do.

### Showing an author's email with git blame

All you have to do to show the email address of an author only is use the `-e` option:

```
git blame index.js -e
```

\
Producing an output like this:

```
^665221a (<some@email.com> 2022-04-30 20:58:04 +0100   8) import { fileURLToPath } from 'url'
```

### Ignoring whitepsace with git blame

You can also ignore whitespace with `git blame`, should your code contain a lot of it. To do this, you can use the `-w` option:

```
git blame index.js -w
```

### Formatting lines with color using git blame

By default, `git blame` produces a wall of white or black text. If you want to differentiate different commits and changes by color, you can use the `--color-lines` or `--color-by-age`:

\
* `--color-lines` colors lines if the line before was a different commit.
* `--color-by-age` colors lines by their age.

### Showing file names with git blame

To show the filename with `git blame`, use the `-f` option. This will show the file name along with the commit ID.

```
git blame index.js -f
```

\
Will produce an output like this:

```
^665221a index.js (Johnny Simpson 2022-04-30 20:58:04 +0100  16) import dotenv from 'dotenv'
```

### Showing line changes from the bottom up (reversed) with git blame

You can also show line changes in reverse with `git blame`, meaning starting at the bottom, and going up. Just add the `--reverse` option to your command:

```
git blame index.js --reverse
```

\


BUNCH

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Coding

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Coding Skills

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Java

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Javascript

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Website Development

2022 - Tip Your Hat Tutorials Best Tutorials

Coding Guru of 2022

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Javascript

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Coding

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Coding Skills

Nominated for 2022 - Tip Your Hat Tutorials Best Tutorials

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Java

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Website Development

Nominated for Coding Guru of 2022

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Typescript

Too Long; Didn't Read

Web Development & Ecommerce Writing Contest

Git blame - Figuring Out Who Modified a Line With Git

Git blame - Figuring Out Who Modified a Line With Git

Too Long; Didn't Read

People Mentioned

Company Mentioned

@smpnjn

RELATED STORIES