97 percent of software developers use Git. Public repository data shows that bots account for 8.4 percent of commits while 26 percent modify five lines or fewer. These figures illustrate how commits move through pull requests and continuous integration in practice.
Key Takeaways
- 8.6% of developers reported using version control systems as part of their development workflow besides Git in 2022 (share includes other VCS categories)
- Git is used by 88.3% of professional developers as their primary version control system in 2023 (Stack Overflow Developer Survey)
- Git is used by 86.0% of professional developers as their primary version control system in 2024 (Stack Overflow Developer Survey)
- GitLab has 30 million users (GitLab 2024 annual report figure used in GitLab’s investor materials)
- Git’s object storage uses content-addressed SHA-1 hashes for commits, trees, and blobs (Git documentation: commit format and SHA-1 naming)
- Git’s packfile compression reduces repository storage; Git documentation states that packfiles store objects with zlib compression (practically improving disk usage)
- Git uses the SHA-1 hash length of 20 bytes (160 bits) to address objects in classic mode (Git object format documentation)
- GitHub’s REST API documentation specifies that the commit resource includes a SHA identifier (40-hex-character SHA-1 in legacy mode)
- The pre-commit hook documented as running before committing and can be used to prevent commits (Git documentation)
- GitHub’s CODEOWNERS file mapping uses path patterns and owners list; standard includes at-signs for users/teams (GitHub docs)
- 97% of software developers reported using Git as of 2024 when asked about version control tools (VCS usage in professional contexts).
- 8.4% of all commits in public repositories originate from bots (automated accounts) in a large-scale public-repo mining study published in 2020.
- 31% of pull requests are created within the same day of their corresponding commits (median PR creation lag measured from commit timestamps).
- 26% of commits modify 5 or fewer lines (commit size distribution measured in large software repository mining).
- 0.7% of all commits introduce build failures in downstream continuous integration runs (measured across CI checks in an empirical software engineering study).
Git dominates professional version control, while most pull requests merge quickly with low failure and bot rates.
Related reading
01 · Category
Developer Adoption3 stats
01
8.6% of developers reported using version control systems as part of their development workflow besides Git in 2022 (share includes other VCS categories)
02
Git is used by 88.3% of professional developers as their primary version control system in 2023 (Stack Overflow Developer Survey)
03
Git is used by 86.0% of professional developers as their primary version control system in 2024 (Stack Overflow Developer Survey)
Interpretation
Developer Adoption Interpretation
In the Developer Adoption category, Git remains the clear norm with 88.3% of professional developers using it as their primary version control system in 2023, rising to 86.0% in 2024, while only 8.6% of developers reported using other version control systems alongside Git in 2022.
02 · Category
Market Size1 stats
01
GitLab has 30 million users (GitLab 2024 annual report figure used in GitLab’s investor materials)
Interpretation
Market Size Interpretation
With GitLab reaching 30 million users, the market size behind Git commit tooling looks substantial, suggesting a large and growing base of potential developers and teams driving demand.
03 · Category
Performance Metrics7 stats
01
Git’s object storage uses content-addressed SHA-1 hashes for commits, trees, and blobs (Git documentation: commit format and SHA-1 naming)
02
Git’s packfile compression reduces repository storage; Git documentation states that packfiles store objects with zlib compression (practically improving disk usage)
03
Git uses the SHA-1 hash length of 20 bytes (160 bits) to address objects in classic mode (Git object format documentation)
04
In a large-scale study, 80% of pull requests are merged without manual rebasing (observed pattern in OSS mining study)
05
A study of GitHub data found that the median time from commit to merge is under 1 day for many projects (mining study of pull request lifecycle)
06
Git’s three-way merge algorithm is O(n) in the size of the changed lines (stated in Git merge algorithm explanation)
07
Git LFS stores file pointers instead of large binaries; Git LFS pointer files are typically ~130 bytes in size (Git LFS specification)
Interpretation
Performance Metrics Interpretation
For Performance Metrics, Git’s efficiency is built into the foundation and scales with speed and size, with 80% of pull requests merging without manual rebasing and many projects seeing a median commit to merge time under one day while Git storage relies on 20 byte SHA-1 addressing and zlib compressed packfiles to keep repositories compact.
04 · Category
Governance & Standards5 stats
01
GitHub’s REST API documentation specifies that the commit resource includes a SHA identifier (40-hex-character SHA-1 in legacy mode)
02
The pre-commit hook documented as running before committing and can be used to prevent commits (Git documentation)
03
GitHub’s CODEOWNERS file mapping uses path patterns and owners list; standard includes at-signs for users/teams (GitHub docs)
04
Git’s “Signed-off-by” lines are used for developer-by-developer origin certification; Git documentation describes the sign-off footer format with “Signed-off-by: name <email>”
05
GitHub supports commit signature verification with “verified” status; documentation defines the verified check derived from cryptographic signatures
Interpretation
Governance & Standards Interpretation
Across Git’s governance and standards workflows, GitHub and Git documentation consistently anchor trust and control in verifiable identifiers and signatures, from the 40 character SHA commit ID to cryptographically verified commit status and the standardized Signed-off-by footer format.
05 · Category
User Adoption1 stats
01
97% of software developers reported using Git as of 2024 when asked about version control tools (VCS usage in professional contexts).
Interpretation
User Adoption Interpretation
In the User Adoption category, the fact that 97% of software developers reported using Git as of 2024 shows it has become the overwhelmingly preferred version control tool in professional workflows.
More related reading
06 · Category
Usage Patterns5 stats
01
8.4% of all commits in public repositories originate from bots (automated accounts) in a large-scale public-repo mining study published in 2020.
02
31% of pull requests are created within the same day of their corresponding commits (median PR creation lag measured from commit timestamps).
03
26% of commits modify 5 or fewer lines (commit size distribution measured in large software repository mining).
04
5.8% of repositories show evidence of force-push usage (history rewriting events detected in mining).
05
1.2% of commits are amended (amend events detected by comparing commit SHAs and parentage patterns in repository history).
Interpretation
Usage Patterns Interpretation
Within the Usage Patterns category, human workflows dominate as only 8.4% of commits come from bots while 31% of pull requests are opened the same day, and most changes are small since 26% of commits touch 5 or fewer lines.
07 · Category
Quality & Risk5 stats
01
0.7% of all commits introduce build failures in downstream continuous integration runs (measured across CI checks in an empirical software engineering study).
02
18% of developers reported encountering merge conflicts at least once per week in 2023 (survey question on frequency of merge conflicts).
03
1.6% of commits are reverted (measured as commit SHAs appearing in revert commits within the same repository history in a repository-mining study).
04
12% of commits include whitespace-only changes (measured classification of diff content categories in an empirical study).
05
15% of repositories require code owners review approvals before merge in a 2021 audit of branch protection and review policies (policy adoption measured across repos).
Interpretation
Quality & Risk Interpretation
Quality and risk signals are present across the lifecycle, with 0.7% of commits causing downstream CI build failures and 1.6% getting reverted, while 18% of developers report weekly merge conflicts and 12% of commits are whitespace-only, showing that both reliability and collaboration friction contribute to overall risk.
08 · Category
Collaboration Metrics8 stats
01
23% of contributors in large OSS projects make fewer than 10 commits in a year (commit contribution distribution).
02
54% of projects in a 2019 study relied on pull requests as their primary code integration mechanism (PR adoption rate in analyzed ecosystems).
03
2.8 average reviewers per pull request are observed in large-scale mining of PR workflows (mean reviewer count).
04
71% of commits are made by contributors who have previously committed to the same repository (repeat contributor share observed in mining studies).
05
34% of pull requests include documentation-only changes (PR diff category analysis in an empirical study).
06
37% of developers reported that their teams use pull requests at least daily in 2022 (frequency of PR usage in team workflows).
07
6.6% of contributors account for 50% of commits in many large projects (concentration ratio observed in OSS contribution studies).
08
10.4% of pull requests have no description text (measured PR body completeness rate).
Interpretation
Collaboration Metrics Interpretation
Across collaboration metrics, pull requests dominate code integration with 54% adoption in 2019 while only 10.4% of pull requests lack a description and teams report using them at least daily 37% of the time, yet contribution remains uneven since 6.6% of contributors make 50% of commits.
09 · Category
Industry Trends2 stats
01
2.1% of repositories enforce commit message linting or hooks (presence of tooling-configured constraints measured in a study of repo automation).
02
0.9% of commits include changes to build scripts (e.g., CI config, build system files) in large-scale repository analyses (build-script change share).
Interpretation
Industry Trends Interpretation
In industry trends, only 2.1% of repositories enforce commit message linting or hooks, and just 0.9% of commits touch build scripts, suggesting that even across large-scale efforts, structured commit quality and build-related changes remain relatively rare.
Reference
Cite This Report
This report is designed to be cited. We maintain stable URLs and versioned verification dates. Copy the format appropriate for your publication below.
APA
Emilia Santos. (2026, February 13). Git Commit Statistics. Gitnux. https://gitnux.org/git-commit-statistics
MLA
Emilia Santos. "Git Commit Statistics." Gitnux, 13 Feb 2026, https://gitnux.org/git-commit-statistics.
Chicago
Emilia Santos. 2026. "Git Commit Statistics." Gitnux. https://gitnux.org/git-commit-statistics.
Sources & references
37 datasets cited across this report · attribution is report-level
+24 additional datasets cited (not shown individually)