GitVolt

A fast, keyboard-friendly desktop Git client with a commit graph at its heart.

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GitVolt is a graphical Git client inspired by GitKraken. If you've used GitKraken, it'll feel familiar on purpose: the lane graph down the middle, the branch and remote sidebar, the commit details on the right, and workflows driven from context menus and the keyboard. GitVolt is an independent project, not affiliated with or endorsed by GitKraken / Axosoft.

Formerly GitBolt. Renamed in 0.7.0. GitBolt 0.6.1 updates to GitVolt by itself and keeps its settings, accounts and undo history. On GitBolt 0.6.0 or earlier? It can't update across the rename: download the latest from GitVoltApp/gitvolt releases.

It's built with a Rust core (using gitoxide for most reads and the git CLI for writes, so your hooks, config and credentials behave exactly as they do in a terminal), a React UI, and Tauri with the Chromium (CEF) runtime.

Status: early (0.x). Usable day to day on Linux and Windows, and new on macOS; expect rough edges.

Platforms

Platform	Status
Linux	Supported: .deb, .rpm and Arch Linux packages
Windows	Supported (10 and 11): an installer (per user) and an MSI (per machine)
macOS	Supported (12 or later, Apple Silicon): a .dmg. Intel Macs aren't supported

Installing

Download the package for your system from the latest release:

• Debian and Ubuntu: sudo apt install ./GitVolt_<version>_amd64.deb
• Arch Linux: sudo pacman -U GitVolt-<version>-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
• Fedora 40 or later: sudo dnf install ./GitVolt-<version>-1.x86_64.rpm (openSUSE Tumbleweed: sudo zypper install --allow-unsigned-rpm ./GitVolt-<version>-1.x86_64.rpm)
• Windows: run GitVolt_<version>_x64-setup.exe (installs for you, no administrator rights) or GitVolt_<version>_x64.msi (installs for all users). They aren't code-signed yet, so Windows SmartScreen warns the first time: More info › Run anyway.
• macOS (Apple Silicon): open GitVolt_<version>_aarch64.dmg and drag GitVolt to Applications. The app is ad-hoc signed, not signed with an Apple Developer ID or notarized, so the first launch is blocked ("Apple could not verify…"). Either run xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/GitVolt.app once, or try to open it, then go to System Settings › Privacy & Security and click Open Anyway.

GitVolt needs Git 2.40 or newer on your PATH (on Windows, Git for Windows; on macOS, Xcode's command line tools or Homebrew's git). SHA256SUMS in each release lists the files' checksums. After that, GitVolt updates itself (see Updates).

Features

Highlights

• Code review on GitHub and GitLab. Comment on a line or a range from the diff's gutter, in every diff mode and on a rendered Markdown diff's blocks; collect the comments as drafts in a pending review, then send them with Comment, Approve or Request changes. Suggested changes show as a diff of the lines they replace, and Apply puts one in your working copy. GitHub.com and GitLab, self-managed included.
• Worktrees. Each worktree with changes has its own WIP row in the graph, with its name and change counts, linked to the commit it has checked out. Switch the tab to another worktree from that row, the sidebar or the toolbar, without reopening the repository, or open one in its own tab. Each keeps its own undo history and commit message draft. Create one from any commit or branch.
• Context menus. Related actions share one row as buttons: Reset with Soft, Mixed and Hard, Copy SHA with Short and Full. A destructive row arms in place: it turns red and says what a second click does, so you confirm without moving the mouse, with any option (such as also moving the branches stacked on it) as a checkbox right under it. A greyed-out row says why. Submenus open as soon as the pointer reaches them, a diagonal move into one doesn't close it, and every row and button works from the keyboard. Rows name what they act on, such as both branches of a merge or a rebase.
• Rendered Markdown diffs. Read a changed .md file as rendered Markdown, inline or side by side, with the changed words highlighted, inside table rows too, and rows added or removed lined up against a gap. GitHub- and GitLab-flavoured: tables, task lists, footnotes, front matter shown as a table, Mermaid diagrams, syntax-highlighted code, the repository's images and videos, emoji shortcodes, issue and MR/PR references, and sanitized inline HTML such as collapsible <details> sections.
• Image diffs. Side by side, swipe, onion skin, and a pixel difference view with an Amplify slider, so near-identical images show where they differ. Zoom to fit or up close with crisp pixels, put a checkerboard, black, white or grey background behind transparency, and match two different sizes so every mode compares the same pixels. Each side shows its dimensions; an SVG can switch to its source and any image to a hex dump, and Copy Image puts it on the clipboard. PNG, JPEG, GIF, WebP, AVIF, BMP, ICO and SVG.
• File previews. HTML pages render in a sandbox, CSV and TSV files show as tables with their rows diffed, and PDFs as pages, old and new side by side. Audio and video get a player for each version, and a font shows its name, sample text and glyphs. A hex view is there for any file.
• Undo history. Each worktree keeps a journal of its last 50 operations, and it survives restarts: commits and amends, checkouts, branch and tag changes, merges, rebases, cherry-picks, reverts, resets, stashes, discards and pulls. Staging has its own undo too.
• Interactive rebase. Besides pick, reword, squash and drop, GitVolt has fixup and edit (the rebase stops so you can amend that commit), predicts which commits will conflict before you start, and lets you move, add or delete branches on the rewritten commits in the same step.
• Stacked MRs/PRs. Create a whole stack of merge or pull requests at once, push and rebase the stack, and have the next one retargeted after a merge, on GitHub and GitLab (self-managed included).
• Free and MIT licensed, private repos included. No account and no telemetry.

Everything else

Graph and navigation

• Pinned trunk. The graph keeps your main branch and the remote branch it tracks at the left, sharing a lane until they diverge. In a fork, it pins the original project's trunk (upstream/main) with your main. You can pick another branch or turn it off.
• Go to the clipboard. Ctrl+V outside a text field goes to what's on the clipboard: a commit hash, an MR/PR (!12, #12 or its link), a forge's commit or file page, a file path with its line number, or a branch or tag.
• Command palette (Ctrl+P) with every action, and every shortcut, including the ones that only work in a context, in Help › Keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl+/).
• Find. Search commits by message, hash or file path with Ctrl+F, older history included.

Workspace

• Tabs and tab groups. A tab for each repository or worktree. Drop a tab onto another to group them; a group's chip collapses it, moves it, or saves and closes it to reopen later.
• Git LFS. Diffs, File View and File History show an LFS file's real contents, never its pointer, with Download for one that isn't local yet. Pull, fetch, and track or stop tracking a file type from a file's menu.
• Submodules. The changes say whether a submodule has new commits, modified content or isn't initialised, and its diff names each commit. Update, sync URLs or open one in a tab.
• Profiles. Each has its own tabs, forge accounts and an optional extra git config file.
• Themes, many built in, dark and light, with per-lane graph colours, density presets and app zoom.

Code review

• Pending review. Your drafts, the summary and the verdict sit in a panel in the MR/PR view, and a chip in the top bar ("Reviewing !12 · 3 pending") stays in view while you browse. A review left pending on the web comes back when its MR/PR opens, and a part-way failure recovers cleanly.
• Review threads in the diff. Threads show as cards under their lines, outdated ones marked; a resolved one folds into its author's avatar in the gutter. F9 and Shift+F9 step through them, and the file list marks files that have threads.
• Compare an MR/PR from its branch card: its merge base, then its head, as a compare in the graph with the changed files open, so the diff matches the forge's.
• Spell check, built in, in the commit message and the MR/PR text fields.

MRs/PRs

• MR/PR view. Docked beside the graph: reply, resolve, react, edit, approve, request changes, change reviewers, assignees and labels, and check out (adding the fork's remote first).
• Pipelines and timeline. Pipeline status, and the activity timeline in rendered Markdown with Mermaid diagrams.
• Merge panel. Merge, or set auto-merge for when the checks pass. When the branch is behind its target (worked out from your fetched commits), one split button rebases it or merges the target in, the way you last chose.
• Creating MRs/PRs with templates, people and label pickers, and drafts. Committing to main in your fork suggests a branch first.
• MR/PR badges on branch chips, an MR/PR section in the sidebar, and hover cards.

Files and diffs

• Diffs: inline, split or hunk, with word-level changes, syntax highlighting and sticky scroll. Stage and unstage files, hunks and lines.
• Rendered HTML in a sandbox: scripts don't run and nothing is fetched, but relative images and stylesheets load from the repository.
• CSV and TSV tables: the header row and row numbers stay in view, and a diff lines the rows up, a changed row's cells marked.
• PDFs as pages with selectable text; a diff shows the two versions side by side, scrolled in step.
• Audio, video and fonts: a player for each side, or a font's name, a pangram and its glyphs. Hex shows any file's bytes.
• File View: read a file rendered or as source, and edit or create a working-tree file. Open in your editor, file manager or default app, old versions included.

History, merges and undo

• Undo menu: undo an older action out of order when nothing later depends on it.
• Merge tool: three-way, with an editable result and a conflict minimap.
• Compare. Pick any two commits to see what changed between them, and swap which one is the "from" and which the "to".
• File history and blame, with each version's diff, and restore a file from any commit.
• Cherry-pick and revert, each with a no-commit variant; stashes; tags.
• Activity log of every git command GitVolt ran, with its output, hooks included.
• Signed commits through your git config, and signature verification in the commit details.

Privacy

• No telemetry, analytics or crash reporting. The update check is the only request GitVolt makes on its own that isn't about your repositories or accounts.
• Locked-down webview. A strict Content Security Policy, and Chromium can't resolve any host name but localhost: the Rust core makes every network request. Images from hosts other than your forge load only after a click. Tokens stay in the system keyring. PRIVACY.md has the details.

Compared with GitKraken

✅ yes, 🟡 partly, ❌ no.

	GitKraken	GitVolt
Commit graph with lanes, branch/tag chips and avatars	✅	✅
Main branch pinned to the left	🟡 When you pin one	✅ Automatic, with its remote branch and, in a fork, the original project's; can be changed or turned off
Tabs, multiple repos, worktrees	✅	✅ Also tab groups
Staging files, hunks and lines	✅	✅
Undo / redo	🟡 Last action only	✅ Last 50 operations, across restarts
Branches, tags, stashes, cherry-pick, revert, reset	✅	✅
Merge and rebase	✅	✅
Interactive rebase	🟡 Pick, reword, squash, drop	✅ Also fixup, edit, conflict prediction and branch moves
Merge conflict tool with an editable result	✅	✅
Push, pull, fetch, remotes, adding a fork as a remote	✅	✅
Diffs: inline, split, hunk, word-level	✅	✅
Image diffs	🟡	✅ Side by side, swipe, onion skin, difference
File previews	❌	✅ CSV/TSV tables with row diffs, PDFs side by side, sandboxed HTML, audio, video, fonts, and a hex view
File history and blame	✅	✅
Rendered Markdown	🟡 Files only	✅ Files, diffs and MR/PR threads
Mermaid diagrams in Markdown	❌	✅
Pull/merge requests: list, view, create, comment, approve, merge	✅	✅ Also auto-merge, and updating a branch that's behind
Inline code review comments	✅ GitHub	✅ GitHub and GitLab: lines and ranges, a pending review, suggested changes you can apply
Stacked pull/merge requests	🟡 GitHub.com only	✅ GitHub and GitLab
Forges	GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Azure DevOps; self-hosted on paid plans	GitHub.com and GitLab, including self-managed
Commit signing	✅	✅ Through your git config
Signature verification	✅	✅
Command palette and keyboard shortcuts	✅	✅ Every one listed in Help › Keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl+/)
Themes	✅	✅ Many built in, with per-lane graph colours
Profiles	✅ Multiple on paid plans	✅
Hide and solo branches	✅	❌ Not there yet
Submodules	✅	✅ State in the file list; update, sync and open in a tab
Git LFS	✅	✅ Real files in diffs and history, download, pull, track by extension
Git Flow	✅	❌ Not planned unless there's demand
Integrated terminal	✅	❌ Not planned
AI commit messages and summaries	✅	❌ Not planned
Issue trackers (Jira, Trello, …)	✅	❌ Not planned
Cloud workspaces and team features	✅	❌ Not planned
No account needed	❌ Sign-in required	✅
No telemetry	❌ Collects usage analytics	✅
Windows and macOS	✅	✅ (macOS: Apple Silicon only)
License	Proprietary; free for local and public repos	MIT

What GitVolt doesn't do

• Planned: Forgejo.
• Not there yet: hiding or soloing branches.
• Not planned unless there's demand: Git Flow.
• Not planned: Intel Macs, an integrated terminal, AI features, issue tracker integrations, cloud workspaces and team features, and Bitbucket, Azure DevOps or GitHub Enterprise Server support. Use the tools you already have for those.

Updates

GitVolt checks GitHub for a new release at startup and once a day. When there is one:

1. A pill at the bottom right says Update to 0.6.0 (the new version). A click downloads the package for how you installed GitVolt.
2. GitVolt checks the download against the release's SHA256SUMS, then offers Install.
3. Install depends on the platform:
   • Linux (.deb, .rpm, Arch): GitVolt runs the package manager through pkexec (pkexec apt install, pkexec dnf install or zypper, pkexec pacman -U), so your desktop asks for your password. If it can't ask, it shows the command to run in a terminal; on Arch, it can show your AUR helper's command instead.
   • Windows: GitVolt starts the installer you installed with (the setup .exe or the .msi) and closes so it can be replaced.
   • macOS: GitVolt copies the new GitVolt.app over the one you run, with no password. If it can't write to its folder, it says to open the .dmg and drag GitVolt to Applications.
4. Restart GitVolt starts the new version (on Linux and macOS).

A build from source only links to the release page.

• Check now: Help › Check for updates.
• Settings › Updates: turn the automatic check off, or include pre-releases.
• Privacy and security: PRIVACY.md says what the check sends, and SECURITY.md how a download is verified.

Building from source

Requirements: a stable Rust toolchain (1.95 or newer, as Tauri 3 requires), Node.js and npm, just, and the Tauri CLI at the version the build expects:

cargo install tauri-cli --version =3.0.0-alpha.4 --locked

Then:

cd ui && npm ci && cd ..
just dev          # run in development mode
just package      # build the .deb, and from it the Arch package and the .rpm
just package-windows  # on Windows: the installer and the MSI (see docs/dev-setup.md)
just package-macos    # on a Mac: the .dmg
just test         # Rust and UI unit tests
just e2e          # end-to-end tests (Playwright)

See docs/dev-setup.md for the full setup, including Chromium's sandbox helper.

Documentation

• ARCHITECTURE.md: how the pieces fit together
• CONTRIBUTING.md: how to contribute
• SECURITY.md: reporting a vulnerability
• PRIVACY.md: what GitVolt stores and sends
• CHANGELOG.md: what changed in each release
• docs/dev-setup.md: the full development setup
• docs/decisions/cef-over-webkitgtk.md: why GitVolt runs on CEF rather than WebKitGTK
• docs/licensing.md: licensing details

License

MIT

GitKraken is a trademark of Axosoft, LLC. It's mentioned here only to describe GitVolt's inspiration and to compare features.