Git Archive: Export Your Code Without .git History

What Does git archive Do?

git archive creates a compressed archive (tar, tar.gz, or zip) of your repository at a specific commit, tag, or branch. Crucially, the archive does not include the .git directory, making it ideal for distributing source code or deploying to servers.

Basic Usage

# Create a tar.gz of the current HEAD
git archive --format=tar.gz --output=project.tar.gz HEAD

# Create a zip archive
git archive --format=zip --output=project.zip HEAD

# Archive a specific tag
git archive --format=tar.gz --output=release-v1.0.tar.gz v1.0.0

Archiving a Subdirectory

# Archive only the src/ directory
git archive --format=tar.gz --output=src-only.tar.gz HEAD src/

Adding a Prefix

Add a top-level directory name to the archive contents:

git archive --format=tar.gz --prefix=my-project/ --output=release.tar.gz v1.0.0

This ensures files extract into a my-project/ directory rather than the current directory.

Piping to Remote

# Extract directly on a remote server via SSH
git archive HEAD | ssh deploy@server "tar -xf - -C /var/www/app"

Using .gitattributes for Export

You can exclude files from archives using .gitattributes:

# .gitattributes
tests/           export-ignore
.github/         export-ignore
.gitignore       export-ignore
README.md        export-ignore

Files marked export-ignore will be omitted from any git archive output.

Archive vs. Clone

	git archive	git clone
Includes .git	No	Yes
Includes history	No	Yes
Size	Minimal	Full repo
Use case	Distribution, deployment	Development

Git archive is the cleanest way to package your code for distribution, ensuring no internal Git data or development files leak into the release.