Lesson 4: Sorting Data with ORDER BY

20 min read Beginner Lesson 4 of 12 12.8k learners

What is ORDER BY?

The ORDER BY clause sorts query results based on one or more columns. By default, it sorts in ascending order.

SQL

SELECT first_name, last_name, city
FROM customers
ORDER BY last_name;

You can specify the sort order using ASC (ascending, default) or DESC (descending).

SQL

SELECT first_name, age
FROM customers
ORDER BY age DESC;

You can sort by more than one column by listing them, separated by commas. SQL applies sorting in the order listed.

SQL

SELECT first_name, last_name, city
FROM customers
ORDER BY city ASC, last_name ASC;

You can also use column aliases defined in the SELECT clause inside ORDER BY.

SQL

SELECT first_name AS fname, last_name AS lname
FROM customers
ORDER BY lname;