Remove files from Git commit

Question

How do I remove a file from the latest commit?

Answer 1

I think other answers here are wrong, because this is a question of moving the mistakenly committed files back to the staging area from the previous commit, without cancelling the changes done to them. This can be done like Paritosh Singh suggested:

git reset --soft HEAD^ 

or

git reset --soft HEAD~1

Then reset the unwanted files in order to leave them out from the commit (the old way):

git reset HEAD path/to/unwanted_file

Note, that since Git 2.23.0 one can (the new way):

git restore --staged path/to/unwanted_file

Now commit again, you can even re-use the same commit message:

git commit -c ORIG_HEAD  

Answer 2

ATTENTION! If you only want to remove a file from your previous commit, and keep it on disk, read juzzlin's answer just above.

If this is your last commit and you want to completely delete the file from your local and the remote repository, you can:

1. remove the file git rm <file>
2. commit with amend flag: git commit --amend

The amend flag tells git to commit again, but "merge" (not in the sense of merging two branches) this commit with the last commit.

As stated in the comments, using git rm here is like using the rm command itself!