Replace with a semantic identifier to the state of the repo at the time the tag is being created. A common pattern is to use version numbers like git tag v1.4. Git supports two different types of tags, annotated and lightweight tags. The previous example created a lightweight tag. Lightweight tags and Annotated tags differ in the amount of accompanying meta data they store. A best practice is to consider Annotated tags as public, and Lightweight tags as private. Annotated tags store extra meta data such as: the tagger name, email, and date. This is important data for a public release. Lightweight tags are essentially 'bookmarks' to a commit, they are just a name and a pointer to a commit, useful for creating quick links to relevant commits.