You can keep the branch commits for detailed history, and look only at merge commits the when you don't need details: git log --first-parent -m This will

You can keep the branch commits for detailed history, and look only at merge commits the when you don't need details: git log --first-parent -m This will show a linear history of merges, treating the merged code as being added in the merge commit. You can add -p to see the diffs.