What it is
I juggle a personal GitHub, a corporate GitHub, and a self-hosted Forgejo, and every machine I set up used to end the same way: tangled credentials, clones committing under the wrong identity, and an afternoon of re-cloning by hand.
Gitbox fixes that. I add each account once, with its own credential (GCM, SSH, or token). Gitbox discovers my repos through the provider APIs, clones each one with the right identity into a predictable folder tree, and shows the health of the whole fleet at a glance. It runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux, and works with GitHub, GitLab, Gitea, Forgejo, and Bitbucket.
It's for anyone who works across more than one Git account or provider and wants every clone set up correctly without thinking about it. Gitbox doesn't reimplement Git: it drives the git, ssh, and Git Credential Manager already on your system.
Install
Download the installer for your platform from the latest release:
| Platform | Download | How to install |
|---|
| Windows | gitbox-win-amd64-setup.exe | Run it. Installs GitboxApp.exe to Program Files with Start Menu shortcuts |
| macOS | gitbox-macos-arm64.dmg / gitbox-macos-amd64.dmg | macOS 13 or later. Open the DMG and run bash "/Volumes/gitbox/Install Gitbox.command" from Terminal |
| Linux | gitbox-x86_64.AppImage | chmod +x and run it. Self-contained, bundles GTK 3 and WebKitGTK |
Prefer the terminal? The bootstrap script downloads the latest release and installs it in one go on macOS, Linux, or Windows (Git Bash). On Linux it also adds gitbox to the applications menu:
bash <(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/LuisPalacios/gitbox/main/scripts/bootstrap.sh)
Run it with --help for options. If you'd rather place the app yourself, each release also ships plain zips (gitbox-<platform>-<arch>.zip) and a checksums.sha256 file.
[!WARNING]
The binaries are not signed or notarized, so macOS Gatekeeper and Windows SmartScreen will flag them. The DMG installer and the bootstrap script clear those flags for you (xattr -cr on macOS, Unblock-File on Windows). From a zip, run xattr -cr GitboxApp.app on macOS, or pick More info → Run anyway in SmartScreen. Either way you're trusting unsigned code, so audit the source and the bootstrap script first, or build it yourself.
Features
- Accounts and credentials. Isolated identities per account with GCM, SSH, or token auth, and a one-click switch between them.
- Discover and clone. Find every repo through the provider API and clone it with the right identity, configured in its own
.git/config.
- What needs me, first. A sidebar with one entry per account and its health, and a Needs attention view that lists only the clones that are behind, ahead, carry local changes, or diverged, plus their open pull requests and pending reviews. Simple mode says the same in plain words for people who don't know Git.
- Safe sync. Fetch everything and pull fast-forward only. Dirty or conflicted clones are never touched, and a result card says what changed.
- Mirrors and moves. Set up push or pull mirrors between providers for backups, and move a repo to another account or provider with a guided flow.
- Workspaces and launchers. Open any clone in your terminal, editor, file manager, or AI harness (Claude Code, Codex, …), and open existing VS Code workspaces.
- Clones anywhere. Adopt clones that live outside the standard folder tree, including repos nested inside a multi-repo container.
- Self-healing setup. A system check for the tools gitbox needs, one-click fixes for global git settings that cause cryptic failures, and dated config backups you can restore.
Discovery, cloning, and repo creation work on all five providers. Mirroring is fully automated on Gitea, Forgejo, and GitLab; for GitHub and Bitbucket gitbox shows the manual steps.
Simple and Advanced modes
Gitbox has two modes, and I switch between them with the toggle in the top bar. Simple is for people who don't know Git and only want their projects safe: each project says in plain words whether the work is saved, and the screen keeps only the buttons they need. New installs start in Simple. Advanced adds every Git detail and tool: ahead, behind, and changed counts, pull request and branch badges, a fetch button per row, the Mirrors and Workspaces views, delete mode, and the compact view.
Updating
Gitbox checks for a new release once a day. When one is out, an update pill appears in the app's footer: click it to download, verify, and install the new version, then restart.
Upgrading from v1
v2 is a desktop app only: the gitbox CLI and its TUI are gone.
- Your config keeps working. v2 reads the same
~/.config/gitbox/gitbox.json without migrating anything.
- The app updates itself. The v1 desktop app offers v2 like any other update, and the Windows installer removes the old CLI and its PATH entry.
- The CLI lives on in v1. The
release/v1 branch gets critical fixes as v1.7.x. On a headless host, run the bootstrap script with --cli-only to install it.
Documentation
Start with the GUI guide and credential setup. The documentation index covers everything else, from architecture to the config format.
Contributing
The developer guide covers building from source, testing, and cross-platform checks.
Disclaimer
Gitbox is provided "as is", without warranty of any kind. I'm not responsible for damage, data loss, or security issues from using gitbox or its installers. The binaries are unsigned, and installing them means accepting that risk. The full source is here under the MIT license; audit it before you use it.
License
MIT
