Every commit you make in Git also includes a commit message that explains the change. While one-line messages are fine for small or obvious changes, as your revision history grows, good commit messages become an important source of information — for example, to understand the rationale behind a specific change made in the past.

A commit message is meant to explain the intent behind the changes, not just what was changed. The code (or diff) already shows what changed. Well-written commit messages make collaboration, code reviews, debugging, and future maintenance easier by helping you and others quickly understand the project’s history without digging into the code of every commit.

A complete commit message can include a short summary line (the subject) followed by a more detailed body if needed. The subject line should be a concise description of the change, while the body can elaborate on the context, rationale, side effects, or other details if the change is more complex.

A commit message has the following structure (note how the subject and the body are separated by a blank line):

Subject line
<blank line>
Body

# lines starting with '#' are ignored (they will not be included in the commit message)

    

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Here is an example commit message:

Find command: make matching case-insensitive

Find command is case-sensitive.

A case-insensitive find is more user-friendly because users cannot be
expected to remember the exact case of the keywords.

Let's,
* update the search algorithm to use case-insensitive matching
* add a script to migrate stress tests to the new format

    

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HANDS-ON: Add a full commit message

Do some changes to a repo you have.
Commit the changes while writing a full commit message (i.e., subject + body).

CLI

When you are ready to commit, use the git commit command (without specifying a commit message).

git commit

    

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This will open your default text editor (like Vim, Nano, or VS Code). Write the commit message inside the editor.

Save and close the editor to create the commit.

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Sourcetree

You can write your full commit message in the textbox you have been using to write commit messages already.

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done!

Following a style guide makes your commit messages more consistent and fit-for-purpose. Many teams adopt established guidelines. These style guides typically contain common conventions that Git users follow when writing commit messages. For example:

• Keep the subject line (the first line) under 50–72 characters.
• Write the subject in the imperative mood (e.g., Fix typo in README rather than Fixed typo or Fixes typo).
• Leave a blank line between the subject and the body, if you include a body.
• Wrap the body at around 72 characters per line for readability.

git config --global core.editor "<editor command>"

    

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