git tag - How to list all Git tags?

Question

In my repository, I have created tags using the following commands.

git tag v1.0.0 -m 'finally a stable release'
git tag v2.0.0 -m 'oops, there was still a major bug!'

How do you list all the tags in the repository?

Answer 1

git tag

should be enough. See git tag man page

---

You also have:

git tag -l <pattern>

List tags with names that match the given pattern (or all if no pattern is given).
Typing "git tag" without arguments, also lists all tags.

---

More recently ("How to sort git tags?", for Git 2.0+)

git tag --sort=<type>

Sort in a specific order.

Supported type is:

• "refname" (lexicographic order),
• "version:refname" or "v:refname" (tag names are treated as versions).

Prepend "-" to reverse sort order.

---

That lists both:

• annotated tags: full objects stored in the Git database. They’re checksummed; contain the tagger name, e-mail, and date; have a tagging message; and can be signed and verified with GNU Privacy Guard (GPG).
• lightweight tags: simple pointer to an existing commit

Note: the git ready article on tagging disapproves of lightweight tag.

Without arguments, git tag creates a “lightweight” tag that is basically a branch that never moves.
Lightweight tags are still useful though, perhaps for marking a known good (or bad) version, or a bunch of commits you may need to use in the future.
Nevertheless, you probably don’t want to push these kinds of tags.

Normally, you want to at least pass the -a option to create an unsigned tag, or sign the tag with your GPG key via the -s or -u options.

---

That being said, Charles Bailey points out that a 'git tag -m "..."' actually implies a proper (unsigned annotated) tag (option '-a'), and not a lightweight one. So you are good with your initial command.

---

This differs from:

git show-ref --tags -d

Which lists tags with their commits (see "Git Tag list, display commit sha1 hashes").
Note the -d in order to dereference the annotated tag object (which have their own commit SHA1) and display the actual tagged commit.

Similarly, git show --name-only <aTag> would list the tag and associated commit.