Reset a single Git file to HEAD

To discard both staged and unstaged changes to one tracked file, restore it from HEAD into the index and working tree:

git diff -- path/to/file.txt
git diff --cached -- path/to/file.txt
# Run only after saving any changes you want to keep.
git restore --source=HEAD --staged --worktree -- path/to/file.txt

git restore requires Git 2.23 or later. The command does not move the branch or change unrelated paths. It overwrites the selected file's local changes; Git may have no recoverable copy of changes that were never staged or committed.

Choose the source and destinations

The older equivalent for a file present in HEAD is:

git checkout HEAD -- path/to/file.txt
# Use a historical version instead:
git checkout a1b2c3d -- path/to/file.txt
# Restore several files:
git restore --source=HEAD --staged --worktree -- src/a.js src/b.js

restore removes a tracked path that is absent from the source tree. Traditional checkout uses overlay behavior by default, so its handling of paths absent from that tree is not identical.

git reset --hard HEAD affects the entire checkout. It is not the single-file form of reset, and it can remove untracked paths that obstruct writing tracked files.

Keep paths unambiguous

The -- separator marks the start of path arguments. For example, git checkout dev switches branches when dev is a branch, whereas git checkout -- dev restores the path from the index. Quote paths containing spaces as well.

For selected hunks, use git restore -p --source=HEAD --staged --worktree -- path/to/file.txt. Review each prompt. You can also stash selected work first with git stash push -- path/to/file.txt; ordinary stash does not include untracked files.

Recover from an accidental reset

If content was staged, its blob may still exist and git fsck --lost-found can help locate dangling objects. Filenames and the complete previous working state are not guaranteed. For content Git never stored, check editor history or external backups. A restore does not create a reflog entry containing the overwritten file contents.

These operations are local. Publishing a later commit is a separate action.

See git-restore and git-reset.