The text and an example in the output of git help rebase seem to contradict about which branch gets changed by git rebase master topic. Here is an edited version of the output, with irrelevant stuff omitted and relationships made specific. NAME git-rebase - Reapply commits on top of another base tip SYNOPSIS git rebase [<upstream> [<branch>]] In the example command below, <upstream> is master and <branch> is topic. If <branch> is specified, git rebase will perform an automatic git switch <branch> before doing anything else. Otherwise it remains on the current branch. Current branch is now <branch>=topic. If <upstream> is not specified ... (irrelevant) All changes made by commits in the current branch (=topic) but that are not in <=upstream> (master) are saved to a temporary area. The current branch is reset to <upstream>, Current branch is now <upstream>=master. The commits that were previously saved into the temporary area are then reapplied to the current branch (master), one by one, in order. I.e., master is changed, topic is not. Assume the following history exists and the current branch is "topic": A---B---C topic / D---E---F---G master From this point, the result of either of the following commands: git rebase master topic would be: A'--B'--C' topic / D---E---F---G master But this diagram shows topic changed, master not.
