SQL ORDER BY

The ORDER BY keyword is used to sort the result-set in ascending or descending order.

Example​

Sort the products by price:

SELECT \* FROM Products  
ORDER BY Price;

Video Explanation​

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Syntax​

SELECT _column1_, _column2, ..._ FROM _table_name_ ORDER BY _column1, column2, ..._ ASC|DESC;

Demo Database​

Below is a selection from the Products table used in the examples:

DESC​

The ORDER BY keyword sorts the records in ascending order by default. To sort the records in descending order, use the DESC keyword.

Example​

Sort the products from highest to lowest price:

SELECT \* FROM Products  
ORDER BY Price DESC;

Order Alphabetically​

For string values the ORDER BY keyword will order alphabetically:

Example​

Sort the products alphabetically by ProductName:

SELECT \* FROM Products  
ORDER BY ProductName;

Alphabetically DESC​

To sort the table reverse alphabetically, use the DESC keyword:

Example​

Sort the products by ProductName in reverse order:

SELECT \* FROM Products  
ORDER BY ProductName DESC;

ORDER BY Several Columns​

The following SQL statement selects all customers from the "Customers" table, sorted by the "Country" and the "CustomerName" column. This means that it orders by Country, but if some rows have the same Country, it orders them by CustomerName:

Example​

SELECT \* FROM Customers  
ORDER BY Country, CustomerName;

Using Both ASC and DESC​

The following SQL statement selects all customers from the "Customers" table, sorted ascending by the "Country" and descending by the "CustomerName" column:

Example​

SELECT \* FROM Customers  
ORDER BY Country ASC, CustomerName DESC;