About
Commitizen is a powerful release management tool that helps teams maintain consistent and meaningful commit messages while automating version management.
What Commitizen Does
By enforcing standardized commit conventions (defaulting to Conventional Commits), Commitizen helps teams:
- Write clear, structured commit messages
- Automatically manage version numbers using semantic versioning
- Generate and maintain changelogs
- Streamline the release process
Key Benefits
With just a simple cz bump command, Commitizen handles:
- Version Management: Automatically bumps version numbers and updates version files based on your commit history
- Changelog Generation: Creates and updates changelogs following the Keep a changelog format
- Commit Standardization: Enforces consistent commit message formats across your team
This standardization makes your commit history more readable and meaningful, while the automation reduces manual work and potential errors in the release process.
Features
- Interactive CLI for standardized commits with default Conventional Commits support
- Intelligent version bumping using Semantic Versioning
- Automatic keep a changelog generation
- Built-in commit validation with pre-commit hooks
- Customizable commit rules and templates
- Multi-format version file support
- Custom rules and plugins via pip
Getting Started
Requirements
Before installing Commitizen, ensure you have:
Installation
Global Installation (Recommended)
The recommended way to install Commitizen is using pipx or uv, which ensures a clean, isolated installation:
Using pipx:
# Install Commitizen
pipx install commitizen
# Keep it updated
pipx upgrade commitizen
Using uv:
# Install commitizen
uv tool install commitizen
# Keep it updated
uv tool upgrade commitizen
(For macOS users) Using Homebrew:
brew install commitizen
Project-Specific Installation
You can add Commitizen to your Python project using any of these package managers:
Using pip:
pip install -U commitizen
Using conda:
conda install -c conda-forge commitizen
Using Poetry:
# For Poetry >= 1.2.0
poetry add commitizen --group dev
# For Poetry < 1.2.0
poetry add commitizen --dev
Using uv:
uv add --dev commitizen
Using pdm:
pdm add -d commitizen
Basic Commands
Initialize Commitizen
To get started, run the cz init command. This will guide you through the process of creating a configuration file with your preferred settings.
Create Commits
Create standardized commits using:
cz commit
# or use the shortcut
cz c
To sign off your commits:
cz commit -- --signoff
# or use the shortcut
cz commit -- -s
For more commit options, run cz commit --help.
Version Management
The most common command you'll use is:
cz bump
This command:
- Bumps your project's version
- Creates a git tag
- Updates the changelog (if
update_changelog_on_bumpis enabled) - Updates version files
You can customize:
For all available options, see the bump command documentation.
Advanced Usage
Get Project Version
# Get your project's version (instead of Commitizen's version)
cz version -p
# Preview changelog changes
cz changelog --dry-run "$(cz version -p)"
This command is particularly useful for automation scripts and CI/CD pipelines.
For example, you can use the output of the command cz changelog --dry-run "$(cz version -p)" to notify your team about a new release in Slack.
Prek and Pre-commit Integration
Commitizen can automatically validate your commit messages using pre-commit hooks.
- Add to your
.pre-commit-config.yaml:
---
repos:
- repo: https://github.com/commitizen-tools/commitizen
rev: master # Replace with latest tag
hooks:
- id: commitizen
- id: commitizen-branch
stages: [pre-push]
- Install the hooks:
prek install --hook-type commit-msg --hook-type pre-push
| Hook | Recommended Stage |
|---|---|
| commitizen | commit-msg |
| commitizen-branch | pre-push |
Note: Replace
masterwith the latest tag to avoid warnings. You can automatically update this with:prek autoupdate
For more details about commit validation, see the check command documentation.
Help & Reference
Command Line Interface
Commitizen provides a comprehensive CLI with various commands. Here's the complete reference:
Quick Reference
| Command | Description | Alias |
|---|---|---|
cz init |
Initialize Commitizen configuration | - |
cz commit |
Create a new commit | cz c |
cz bump |
Bump version and update changelog | - |
cz changelog |
Generate changelog | cz ch |
cz check |
Validate commit messages | - |
cz version |
Show version information | - |
Additional Resources
Getting Help
For each command, you can get detailed help by adding --help:
cz commit --help
cz bump --help
cz changelog --help
For more details, visit our documentation site.
Setting up bash completion
Commitizen supports command-line completion through argcomplete, which is automatically installed as a dependency. This feature provides intelligent auto-completion for all Commitizen commands and options.
Supported Shells
- Bash: Full support
- Zsh: Limited support
- Fish: Limited support
- Tcsh: Limited support
Installation Methods
Global Installation (Recommended)
If you installed Commitizen globally (e.g., using pipx or brew), you can enable global completion:
# Enable global completion for all Python applications
sudo activate-global-python-argcomplete
User-Specific Installation
For a user-specific installation that persists across sessions:
# Add to your shell's startup file (e.g., ~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc)
register-python-argcomplete cz >> ~/.bashrc
Temporary Installation
For one-time activation in your current shell session:
# Activate completion for current session only
eval "$(register-python-argcomplete cz)"
Verification
After installation, you can verify the completion is working by:
- Opening a new terminal session
- Typing
czfollowed by a space and pressingTABtwice - You should see a list of available commands
For more detailed information about argcomplete configuration and troubleshooting, visit the argcomplete documentation.
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Release files for commitizen 4.18.1
For a detailed explanation of source distributions (sdists) and built distributions (wheels), please see the package formats documentation.
Source distribution (sdist)
| File | Size | Uploaded | |
|---|---|---|---|
| commitizen-4.18.1.tar.gz | 68.5 kB | Details |
Built distribution (wheel)
| File | Interpreter | ABI | Platform | Reset |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| commitizen-4.18.1-py3-none-any.whl | Python 3 | none | any | Details |
Total release size: 159.0 kB
Release files / commitizen-4.18.1.tar.gz
| Download URL | commitizen-4.18.1.tar.gz |
|---|---|
| Size | 68.5 kB |
| Tags | Source |
|
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums |
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|
|
BLAKE2b-256 checksum How to use checksums |
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|
| Upload date | |
|
Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? What is trusted publishing? |
Yes |
| Uploaded via |
twine/7.0.0 CPython/3.13.14
|
Provenance
Provenance describes where a file came from. On PyPI, provenance is shared via attestations, which provide a verifiable record of the build or publishing details. View details, limitations and caveats.
PyPI Publish Attestation
PyPI verified that this artifact, at this checksum, originated from the publisher listed below.
Signed by GitHub Actions, verified by PyPI on Sep 13, 2026.
Transparency logRelease files / commitizen-4.18.1-py3-none-any.whl
| Download URL | commitizen-4.18.1-py3-none-any.whl |
|---|---|
| Size | 90.5 kB |
| Tags | Python 3 |
|
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums |
16ed052ff775bf42cad85bc09075db110ca7ba84f49233fc642629a0da65862b
|
|
BLAKE2b-256 checksum How to use checksums |
eb3ec15f31a04a3432bce3312cde554ba73e8c5232a3615f08f39264a447c427
|
| Upload date | |
|
Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? What is trusted publishing? |
Yes |
| Uploaded via |
twine/7.0.0 CPython/3.13.14
|
Provenance
Provenance describes where a file came from. On PyPI, provenance is shared via attestations, which provide a verifiable record of the build or publishing details. View details, limitations and caveats.
PyPI Publish Attestation
PyPI verified that this artifact, at this checksum, originated from the publisher listed below.
Signed by GitHub Actions, verified by PyPI on Sep 13, 2026.
Transparency log
