githubtakeout

Backup and archive Git Repos and Gists from GitHub

• Copyright (c) 2015-2026 Corey Goldberg

Development	GitHub
License	MIT
Releases
Supported Python Versions

About:

githubtakeout is a data export tool for backing up and archiving Git repositories hosted on GitHub. It clones a user's repos and creates an archive of each.

It supports public/private repos and public/secret gists. By default, it doesn't save commit history or branches (.git directory), or Gist repositories (both can be enabled with command line options).

When you run the program, archives of your repos will be saved in a directory named backups inside your current working directory, unless a different location is specified using the --dir option.

Archives are saved in compressed zip format (.zip) by default. You can also save as tarballs (.tar.gz) using the --format=tar option, or skip archiving using the --format=none option.

If a repo with history exists from a previous run, it will pull new changes. Otherwise, it will clone the repo. Use the --keep if you don't want repos deleted after an archive is created.

Requirements:

• Python 3.12+
• Git 1.7+

Installation:

Install from PyPI:

pip install githubtakeout

Authentication:

By default, githubtakeout will only retrieve an account's public repos. To access private repos and secret gists, you need to authenticate.

First, you must create a personal access token on Github (either a fine-grained or classic personal access token). Once you have a token, you can set the GITHUB_TOKEN environment variable:

$ export GITHUB_TOKEN=<access token>

You can also set this in an .env file in the current directory. It should contain:

GITHUB_TOKEN=<access token>

If you prefer to be prompted for your token each time you run the program, use the --token argument.

CLI Options:

$ githubtakeout --help
usage: githubtakeout [-h] [--dir DIR] [--pattern PATTERN] [--skip_pattern PATTERN]
                     [--format {tar,zip,none}] [--gists] [--history]
                     [--skip_forks] [--keep] [--list] [--token]
                     username

positional arguments:
  username                 github username

options:
  -h, --help               show this help message and exit
  --dir DIR                output directory (default: .)
  --pattern PATTERN        regex matching repo names to include
  --skip_pattern PATTERN   regex matching repo names to skip
  --format {tar,zip,none}  archive format (default: zip)
  --gists                  include gists
  --history                include commit history and branches (.git directory)
  --skip_forks             skip repos that are forks
  --keep                   keep repos after archiving
  --list                   list repos only
  --token                  prompt for auth token

Screenshot:

Usage Examples:

Install from PyPI with pipx, Run:

pipx install githubtakeout
githubtakeout <github username>

Clone Repo, Create/Activate Virtual Environment, Install from Source, Run:

git clone git@github.com:cgoldberg/githubtakeout.git
cd ./githubtakeout
python3 -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate
pip install .
githubtakeout <github username>