A Beginner's Guide to Forking and Syncing Personal GitHub Repositories 📝

Tori — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 17:58:57 +0000

This guide explains how to fork a repository, set the upstream, fetch changes, merge, and push changes to your personal fork using GitHub and the Visual Studio Code terminal.

These instructions assume you’re the only one working in the fork. Steps may differ if the repository is shared with collaborators.

Prerequisites

Git installed on your computer
GitHub account
Visual Studio Code

Terminologies

Local: Your copy of the repo on your computer.
Remote: A version of the repo hosted online (e.g., GitHub).
Origin: The default name for your fork's remote on GitHub.
Upstream: The original repo you forked from.

⭐ Step 1: Fork the Repository

Go to the original repository on GitHub.
Click Fork (top right) and select your account.

Deselect the option to copy only the main branch if you want to make a copy of all available branches.

You'll be taken to your page for your newly created fork.

⭐ Step 2: Clone Your Fork Locally

On the page for your newly created fork, navigate to <> Code and copy the web URL.
In your VSCode terminal, move into the folder you want the repository to be based in. You can do this one of two ways:
- Clicking File -> Open Folder -> Select the folder
- Use the command cd to navigate the directory of a folder that's already open. Read more about cd here -> cd in Git
Once you're in the right folder, use the command git clone and paste the URL.
cd into the newly created repo folder.

⭐ Step 3: Create a New Branch

⚠️ Before creating a new branch, make sure you're on main. Always do your work in a branch other than main (whether it's for features, experiments, or practice) so you keep main clean and conflict-free.

git branch to check which branch you're on.
- It will list all your local branches, and the one you’re currently on will be marked with an asterisk *.
git checkout -b new-branch-name creates and moves to your new branch.

⭐ Step 4: Check and Add Upstream Remote

git remote -v to list the current remotes associated with the local repository. (On a new fork, you'll only see origin)
git remote add upstream https://github.com/ORIGINAL-OWNER/REPO-NAME.git adds the upstream.
Verify with git remote -v.

Remember: Upstream is the original repository you forked from. Adding an upstream lets you pull in updates from the source project to keep your copy up to date.

⭐ Step 5: Work on Your New Branch

⚠️ Make sure you switch to your new branch so your changes don't touch main.

Now you can edit files, using these commands as you go:

Check changed files: git status
Stage files
- Stage one file: git add insert-file-name
- Stage all changed files: git add .
Commit staged changes: git commit -m "Your commit message"

⭐ Step 6: Fetch Updates from Upstream

If you have any uncommitted changes, stage and commit them.
Switch to your main branch.
git fetch upstream to fetch the latest changes from the original repo.

NOTE: This fetches changes for all branches, not just main.

⭐ Step 7: Sync Upstream Changes with Local Main

git merge upstream/main.

This updates your main branch with the latest changes from the original repo (upstream). (If you want to sync other branches, you need to check out each branch first and merge it following the same steps.)

⭐ Step 8: Bring Changes from main to Your Branch

This ensures your branch has the latest changes you synced with main in Step 7.

git checkout example-branch
git merge main
A file will open where you can edit the merge commit message.
Closing the file confirms the merge.

If there are conflicts, there are a few options you can read about here -> How to Resolve Merge Conflicts in Git

⭐ Step 9: Push Updates on Your Local Branch to Your Fork on GitHub

⚠️ Make sure all your changes are staged and committed before pushing.

git checkout example-branch
git push origin new-branch-name pushes your local branch to your GitHub fork (origin).

⭐ Step 10: Update Your Fork's main on GitHub

git checkout main
git push origin main

This pushes your local main to your fork's main on GitHub.

🎉 Your fork is now up to date and ready for development! Remember to regularly fetch and merge from upstream so your work stays in sync with the original repository.

Forem: Tori