What is a "three-way" merge?

Short answer: A merge that involves the two branch tips and their common ancestor to determine how to combine changes, potentially creating a new merge commit. Long Answers:

Real-world example (ShopNest)

Feature work for “UPI payment” lives on feature/upi-payment. Open a PR to main; resolve conflicts before merge.

Say this in the interview

1. Define — one clear sentence (the short answer above).
2. Example — relate it to a project like ShopNest or your real work.
3. Trade-off — when you would not use it.