Is git stash dangerous?

LOW risk. Stashes can be accidentally dropped; they're not a backup.

git stash

Q: What does git stash do?

Temporarily save and restore uncommitted work. git stash saves your working directory changes and index to a stack, letting you switch contexts cleanly and restore later. Supports multiple stashes, partial stashing with -p, and stashing untracked files with -u.

Temporarily save and restore uncommitted work.

low risk

interactive breakdown — edit the command and press Explain

What it does

git stash saves your working directory changes and index to a stack, letting you switch contexts cleanly and restore later. Supports multiple stashes, partial stashing with -p, and stashing untracked files with -u.

Common flags

Flag	Meaning
`push -m`	Stash with a descriptive message
`pop`	Apply most recent stash and remove it
`apply`	Apply stash without removing it
`list`	Show all stashes
`drop`	Delete a specific stash
`-u`	Include untracked files
`-p`	Interactively choose hunks to stash

Examples

git stash push -m 'WIP: refactor auth module'Stash with descriptive message · explain & risk-check →

git stash listView all stashes · explain & risk-check →

git stash popRestore most recent stash · explain & risk-check →

git stash show -p stash@{1}View diff of second stash · explain & risk-check →

Pro tip

Use `git stash push -u -m 'description'` to include untracked files — otherwise new files you've created stay in the working tree and may contaminate the branch you switch to.

git log git rebase git

Open the full explainer →More in Git

Reference text is hand-written and may be incomplete — check man git for your version. Test destructive commands on a non-production system first.