Question 1

What is a good git branch naming convention?

Accepted Answer

A good branch name is short, descriptive and prefixed with its purpose: feature/, bugfix/, hotfix/, release/, chore/ or docs/. Use kebab-case (lowercase with hyphens), include the ticket number if you have one, and avoid spaces, underscores or special characters. Examples: feature/login-page, bugfix/PROJ-123-cart-total, hotfix/security-patch.

Question 2

Should I use kebab-case or snake_case in branch names?

Accepted Answer

Kebab-case (lowercase-with-hyphens) is the most widely adopted convention. Hyphens are shell-safe, easier to read, and match the URL-style naming used by GitHub and GitLab. Snake_case works too but is less common and can clash with shell variable expansion.

Question 3

How long should a git branch name be?

Accepted Answer

Aim for under 50-60 characters. Long branch names break terminal UIs, push notifications and CI logs. If your ticket title is verbose, summarize it to 3-5 words and let the ticket number carry the rest.

Question 4

Why prefix branches with feature/ or bugfix/?

Accepted Answer

Type prefixes (popularized by GitFlow) make it instantly clear what a branch is for. They enable smart defaults in pull-request templates, CI pipelines and automated changelog generators. PR reviewers see 'feature/' and know it's new functionality, not a fix.