What is the difference between 'git pull' and 'git fetch'?

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git pull and git fetch are both used to update your local repository with changes from a remote repository, but they work differently.

git fetch downloads the latest changes from the remote repository and updates your local repository's copy of the remote branch(es). However, it does not merge those changes into your current working branch. Instead, it simply downloads the changes and leaves them in a separate branch in your local repository called origin/<branch>. This allows you to review the changes before merging them into your working branch.

git pull, on the other hand, does both git fetch and git merge in a single command. It downloads the latest changes from the remote repository and merges them into your current working branch.

Therefore, git fetch is useful if you want to see what has changed in the remote repository before merging it into your working branch. And git pull is useful when you want to quickly update your working branch with the latest changes from the remote repository.