Disclaimer: This approach worked for me, but it may not necessarily be the best technique

Step 1: Create Mirror Clone of Old Repository

git clone --mirror - Makes a total copy of the original repo. This includes every reference: remote-tracking branches, notes. Remote tracking is also set up so that if git remote update is run, all refs will be overwritten from origin, ie: a functionally identical copy of original repo

old-repo-url - Replace with Git URL of old repo

new-repo - Replace with the name of your new directory.

git clone --mirror old-repo-url new-repo

Step 2: Remove Remote Reference to Old Repository

cd new-repo
git remote remove origin

Step 3: Add Remote Reference to New Repository

new-repo-url - Replace with Git URL of your new repo

git remote add origin new-repo-url

Step 4: Push All References to New Repository

git push --all
git push --tags

Step 5: Clone New Repository

rm -rf new-repo - Deletes mirrored cloned repo from Step 1 as it can't be used for new commits because we cloned it from the old-repo-url

new-repo-url, new-repo - Replace with new repo URL and name

cd ..
rm -rf new-repo
git clone new-repo-url new-repo

Congrats! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

You now have a complete clone of the original repo with all the commit history!

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Illustration by Murat Kalkavan from Icons8

See Also

• https://www.git-scm.com/docs/git-clone
• https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3959924/whats-the-difference-between-git-clone-mirror-and-git-clone-bare
• https://itnext.io/git-repository-transfer-keeping-all-history-670fe04cd5e4?gi=bf7b9a1c6dcb