git-time

Estimate how much time was likely spent working on a repository, using only Git commit history.

git-time looks at when commits were made and groups nearby commits into work sessions. If 2 commits are close together, it assumes the time between them was active work. If they are far apart, it assumes the developer stopped and later started a new session.

Because Git only records commits, the result is an estimate. It cannot see time spent reading code, debugging before the first commit, taking breaks, or working after the last commit. To account for some of that invisible setup time, each session gets a fixed offset.

For example, with the default settings:

10:00  commit
11:00  commit
15:00  commit

The 10:00 and 11:00 commits are treated as one session: 1 hour between commits plus a 2-hour session offset, for three estimated hours. The 15:00 commit is far enough away to start a new session, so it gets another 2-hour offset. The total estimate is 5 hours.

Install

Simply download a binary for your system from the latest release or do

go install github.com/lexeko/git-time/cmd/git-time@latest

From a local checkout:

go install ./cmd/git-time

Usage

Analyze the current branch in the current repository:

git-time

Example output:

5 hours, 3 commits

Analyze a different repository:

git-time --path ~/src/project

Analyze all branches without double-counting commits reachable from multiple branches:

git-time --all-branches

Show session details:

git-time --sessions

Write JSON:

git-time --format json

Write JSON with session details:

git-time --format json --sessions

Filter by date:

git-time --since thisweek --until today
git-time --since 2026-01-01 --until 2026-01-31

Treat multiple emails as one person:

git-time --email-alias old@example.com=new@example.com

Options

--path, -p <path>                 Git repository path (default: current directory)
--session-gap, -g <minutes>       Max gap between commits in one session (default: 120)
--session-offset, -o <minutes>    Minutes credited at the start of each session (default: 120)
--since, -s <date>                all, today, yesterday, thisweek, lastweek, thismonth, lastmonth, YYYY-MM-DD
--until, -u <date>                all, today, yesterday, thisweek, lastweek, thismonth, lastmonth, YYYY-MM-DD
--branch, -b <name>               Analyze one branch (default: current branch)
--all-branches, -a                Analyze all branches
--merges, -m                      Include merge commits
--no-merges                       Exclude merge commits (default)
--email-alias, -e <other=main>    Repeatable email alias mapping
--format, -f <text|json>          Output format (default: text)
--sessions                        Show session breakdown
--help, -h                        Show help

How Sessions Work

session-gap is the largest idle gap, in minutes, that still counts as one continuous work session. With the default --session-gap 120, commits at 10:00, 11:00, and 12:00 are one session, but commits at 10:00 and 15:00 are separate sessions.

session-offset estimates invisible work before the first commit in each session. With the default --session-offset 120, a single isolated commit counts as two hours.

The final total is rounded to the nearest whole hour.

JSON Example

{
  "commit_count": 2,
  "total_minutes": 180,
  "total_hours": 3,
  "authors": [
    {
      "email": "dev@example.com",
      "commit_count": 2,
      "total_minutes": 180,
      "total_hours": 3,
      "sessions": [
        {
          "author_email": "dev@example.com",
          "start": "2026-01-02T10:00:00Z",
          "end": "2026-01-02T11:00:00Z",
          "commits": 2,
          "minutes": 180
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Inspiration

This project was inspired by git-hours by Kimmo Brunfeldt (https://github.com/kimmobrunfeldt/git-hours), but is a clean reimplementation using the Git CLI instead of nodegit.