How to fix Git for Windows error: "could not lock config file C:/file/path/to/.gitconfig: File exists"?

Question

While trying to set up Git with my GitHub account the following error keeps persisting whenever I try to do a global config.

It works fine for repositories, but the global doesn't work.

Here's how it shows:

$ git config --global user.name "username"
error: could not lock config file C:/Path/to/.gitconfig: File exists

I'm using Git 2.21.0 on Windows 10 Pro.

Answer 1

Since you're on Windows 10, it could be an issue if your .gitconfig is located at C:. If that's the case, try running your git bash with Administrator privileges (right-click on your executable, select More > run as Administrator) and see if that works. You need administrator privileges to work on files at the root of C:. That worked for me.