Move branches between stacks

Change branch dependencies by moving branches between stacks or tearing them off into new stacks.

You can drag a branch from one stack to another to change what it depends on. You can also tear a branch off into an independent stack.

Move a branch to another stack

Drag the branch to the position where it belongs in the target stack:

Drag the branch header - Click and hold on the branch header (the section displaying the branch name)
Drop on target location - Drag it to the position where you want to insert it in another stack

When you hover over a valid drop target during the drag operation, you'll see visual indicators showing where the branch will be placed.

There are two types of drop zones when moving branches:

Between branches - Drop the branch between two existing branches in a stack to insert it at that position
Top of stack - Drop at the top of a stack to make the moved branch the first branch

The drop zones appear as horizontal lines with visual feedback when you hover over them during a drag operation.

You can also separate a branch from its current stack and create a new independent stack for it. This is called "tearing off" a branch.

Drag the branch header - Click and hold on the branch header you want to separate
Drop outside the stacks area - Drag it to the designated dropzone outside of the existing stacks

This creates a new standalone stack containing only that branch.

Not all branches can be moved. A branch must meet these conditions to be movable:

No conflicts - The branch must not have any merge conflicts
Has commits - The branch must contain at least one commit
Different target stack - You can only move branches to different stacks (not within the same stack)

When you move a branch:

Branch is extracted - The branch and its commits are extracted from the source stack
Rebasing occurs - The branch is rebased onto the new base in the target stack
References updated - Git references are updated to reflect the new structure
Stack cleanup - If the moved branch was the last one in its stack, that stack is deleted

If the branch has an associated pull request or merge request:

Pull request bases - Each pull request targets the nearest branch below it that also has a pull request
GitHub stack membership - GitButler updates the native stack on GitHub to match the new branch order
Description-based stacks - Repositories without native stack support get updated stack information in their pull request descriptions

The synchronization runs on the next push or pull request creation.