Ignoring files From time to time, there are files you don't want Git to check in to GitHub. There are a few ways to tell Git which files to ignore. Create a local .gitignore If you create a file in your repository named .gitignore, Git uses it to determine which files and directories to ignore, before you make a commit. 1 ) In Terminal, navigate to the location of your Git repository. 2 ) Enter touch .gitignore to create a .gitignore file. If you already have a file checked in, and you want to ignore it, Git will not ignore the file if you add a rule later. In those cases, youuntrack the file first, by running the following command in your terminal: $ git rm --cached OR $ git rm --cached `git ls-files -i -X .gitignore`