When working with Git, you often want to create a new feature branch based on a common base branch such as develop. Doing this repeatedly with full Git commands can get tedious, so let’s streamline it using a custom Zsh function.

The manual way

Normally, to create and switch to a new branch based on develop, you would run:

git switch -c feature/login develop

This tells Git to:

• Create a new branch called feature/login
• Base it on develop
• Switch to it immediately

If you do this several times a day, it quickly becomes repetitive. Let’s fix that.

Adding a custom command in Zsh

The cleanest way to automate this is by adding a function to your ~/.zshrc file. Functions handle parameters more gracefully than aliases, which makes them perfect for this use case.

Open your Zsh configuration:

nano ~/.zshrc

Then add the following function:

gbd() {
  if [ -z "$1" ]; then
    echo "Usage: gbd <new-branch-name>"
    return 1
  fi

  git switch -c "$1" develop
}

Save the file and reload your shell:

source ~/.zshrc

Now you can run:

gbd feature/login

This will create a new branch feature/login based on develop and switch to it immediately.

Keeping develop up to date automatically

If you want to make sure your develop branch is always up to date before branching off, you can enhance the function like this:

gbd() {
  if [ -z "$1" ]; then
    echo "Usage: gbd <new-branch-name>"
    return 1
  fi

  git fetch origin develop:develop && git switch -c "$1" develop
}

This fetches the latest version of develop from the remote repository before creating your new branch.

Optional: add naming conventions

If your team uses naming conventions such as feature/, fix/, or hotfix/, you can add a simple prefix automatically:

gbd() {
  if [ -z "$1" ]; then
    echo "Usage: gbd <type>/<name> (e.g. feature/login)"
    return 1
  fi

  git fetch origin develop:develop && git switch -c "$1" develop
}

Now you can run:

gbd feature/login

and your workflow stays consistent across projects.

Conclusion

With a simple function in your ~/.zshrc, you can create new branches from develop in one short command:

gbd new-branch-name

This small change eliminates repetitive typing, keeps your workflow consistent, and ensures you always start from the correct base branch.