50 characters or less for the subject
Use imperative mood: "add feature" not "added feature" or "adding feature"
Don't capitalize the first letter after the type prefix
No period at the end

Types

Type	When to use
`feat`	New user-facing feature
`fix`	Bug fix
`refactor`	Code restructuring without behavior change
`docs`	Documentation changes
`test`	Adding or updating tests
`chore`	Build, CI, tooling, deps
`perf`	Performance improvement
`style`	Formatting, whitespace (not CSS)
`ci`	CI/CD pipeline changes
`revert`	Reverting a previous commit

Scope (Optional)

The area of the codebase affected:

feat(auth): add OAuth2 login flow
fix(api): handle null response from payments endpoint
refactor(db): extract query builder into module

Body (When Needed)

Explain why, not what (the diff shows what):

fix(checkout): prevent duplicate order submissions

The submit button was not disabled after the first click,
allowing users to create multiple orders. This caused
duplicate charges in Stripe.

Footer (When Needed)

BREAKING CHANGE: rename `getUserById` to `findUser`

Closes #456
Co-authored-by: Name <email>

Examples

Good:

feat(dashboard): add real-time notification bell
fix: resolve race condition in WebSocket reconnect
refactor(api): consolidate error handling middleware
test: add integration tests for payment webhook
chore: upgrade TypeScript to 5.4

Bad:

fixed stuff
WIP
update
changes
asdf

When to Commit

Each commit should represent one logical change
Don't mix refactoring with feature work in the same commit
Don't commit half-working code (use git stash instead)
Commit early and often on feature branches, squash before merge if needed

Breaking Changes

If the commit introduces a breaking change:

Add ! after the type: feat(api)!: change auth token format
Add BREAKING CHANGE: in the footer with migration instructions

writing-commit-messages

Writing Commit Messages

Format

Subject Line Rules