gerrit create-project - Create a new hosted project


ssh -p <port> <host> gerrit create-project [--owner <GROUP> … | -o <GROUP> …] [--parent <NAME> | -p <NAME> ] [--suggest-parents | -S ] [--permissions-only] [--description <DESC> | -d <DESC>] [--submit-type <TYPE> | -t <TYPE>] [--use-contributor-agreements | --ca] [--use-signed-off-by | --so] [--use-content-merge] [--require-change-id | --id] [[--branch <REF> | -b <REF>] …] [--empty-commit] [--max-object-size-limit <N>] [--plugin-config <PARAM> …] { <NAME> | --name <NAME> }


Creates a new bare Git repository under gerrit.basePath, using the project name supplied. The newly created repository is empty (has no commits), but is registered in the Gerrit database so that the initial commit may be uploaded for review, or initial content can be pushed directly into a branch.

If replication is enabled, this command also connects to each of the configured remote systems over SSH and uses command line git on the remote system to create the empty repository.


Caller must be a member of the privileged Administrators group, or have been granted the Create Project global capability.


This command is intended to be used in scripts.



Required; name of the new project to create. If name ends with .git the suffix will be automatically removed.


Deprecated alias for the <NAME> argument. This option may be removed in a future release.


Name of the initial branch(es) in the newly created project. Several branches can be specified on the command line. If several branches are specified then the first one becomes HEAD of the project. If none branches are specified then default value (master) is used.


Name of the group(s) which will initially own this repository. The specified group(s) must already be defined within Gerrit. Several groups can be specified on the command line.

Defaults to what is specified by repository.*.ownerGroup in gerrit.config.


Name of the parent project to inherit access rights through. If not specified, the parent is set to the default project All-Projects.


Suggest parent candidates. This option cannot be used with other arguments. Print out a list of projects that are already parents to other projects, thus it can help the user find a suitable parent for the new project.


Create the project only to serve as a parent for other projects. The new project’s Git repository will be initialized to have HEAD point to refs/meta/config.


Initial description of the project. If not specified, no description is stored.

Description values containing spaces should be quoted in single quotes ('). This most likely requires double quoting the value, for example --description "'A description string'".


Action used by Gerrit to submit an approved change to its destination branch. Supported options are:

  • FAST_FORWARD_ONLY: produces a strictly linear history.

  • MERGE_IF_NECESSARY: create a merge commit when required.

  • REBASE_IF_NECESSARY: rebase the commit when required.

  • MERGE_ALWAYS: always create a merge commit.

  • CHERRY_PICK: always cherry-pick the commit.

Defaults to MERGE_IF_NECESSARY unless repository.<name>.defaultSubmitType is set to a different value. For more details see Submit Types.


If enabled, Gerrit will try to perform a 3-way merge of text file content when a file has been modified by both the destination branch and the change being submitted. This option only takes effect if submit type is not FAST_FORWARD_ONLY. Disabled by default.


If enabled, authors must complete a contributor agreement on the site before pushing any commits or changes to this project. Disabled by default.


--so: If enabled, each change must contain a Signed-off-by line from either the author or the uploader in the commit message. Disabled by default.


Require a valid Change-Id footer in any commit uploaded for review. This does not apply to commits pushed directly to a branch or tag.


Creates an initial empty commit for the Git repository of the project that is newly created.


Define maximum Git object size for this project. Pushes containing an object larger than this limit will be rejected. This can be used to further limit the global receive.maxObjectSizeLimit and cannot be used to increase that globally set limit.

Common unit suffixes of k, m, or g are supported.


A plugin configuration parameter that should be set for this project. The plugin configuration parameter must be specified in the format <plugin-name>.<parameter-name>=<value>. Only parameters that are explicitly declared by a plugin can be set. Multiple --plugin-config options can be specified to set multiple plugin parameters.


Create a new project called tools/gerrit:

$ ssh -p 29418 gerrit create-project tools/gerrit.git

Create a new project with a description:

$ ssh -p 29418 gerrit create-project tool.git --description "'Tools used by build system'"

Note that it is necessary to quote the description twice. The local shell needs double quotes around the value to ensure the single quotes are passed through SSH as-is to the remote Gerrit server, which uses the single quotes to delimit the value.


If the replication plugin is installed, the plugin will attempt to perform remote repository creation by a Bourne shell script:

mkdir -p '/base/project.git' && cd '/base/project.git' && git init --bare && git update-ref HEAD refs/heads/master

For this to work successfully the remote system must be able to run arbitrary shell scripts, and must have git in the user’s PATH environment variable. Administrators could also run this command line by hand to establish a new empty repository.

A custom extension or plugin may also be developed to implement the NewProjectCreatedListener extension point and handle custom logic for remote repository creation.