Git Stash: Save Work for Later

The Problem

You're working on a feature, but suddenly need to switch branches to fix a bug. Your changes aren't ready to commit. What do you do?

Git stash saves your uncommitted changes and gives you a clean working directory.

How It Works

Working Directory (dirty)    Stash Stack
┌──────────────────┐        ┌──────────────────┐
│ Modified files    │──stash→│ stash@{0}: latest │
│ Staged changes    │        │ stash@{1}: older  │
└──────────────────┘        └──────────────────┘
        ↑                           │
        └────── stash pop ──────────┘

Essential Commands

# Save current changes to the stash
git stash
Save with a description
git stash save "work on navbar"
List all stashes
git stash list
Restore the most recent stash
git stash pop
Restore without removing from stash
git stash apply
Remove a specific stash
git stash drop stash@{0}
Clear all stashes
git stash clear

Real-World Scenario

# You're working on a feature...
echo "new feature" >> feature.js
git add feature.js
Boss says: "Fix the homepage bug NOW!"
git stash save "feature work in progress"
Now your directory is clean - switch branches
git checkout main
... fix the bug, commit, push ...
Come back to your feature
git checkout feature-branch
git stash pop
Your changes are back!

Stash with Untracked Files

By default, git stash only saves tracked files. To include new files:

git stash -u    # Include untracked files
git stash -a    # Include ALL files (even ignored ones)

Summary