Using SQL ORDER BY and SORT BY

SQL ORDER BY Keyword: Main Tips

• The keyword ORDER BY is used for sorting the result-set that is created using the SELECT statement.
• Using this statement you can sort the result-set by one or multiple columns in an ascending or descending order.
• ORDER BY sorts in an ascending order by default.

Syntax of SQL ORDER BY Keyword

SELECT * FROM users ORDER BY email ASC, username DESC;

Demo Database

In this example, we are using a basic SQL database.

Right here we have a section from the table called "Users":

The following SQL statement selects all users from the "users" table, sorted by the "email" column:

SELECT * FROM users ORDER BY email;

SQL ORDER BY Keyword ORDER BY DESC

This statement will select every user from the table called "users", and sort them in a descending order by the "email" column:

SELECT * FROM users ORDER BY email DESC;

SQL ORDER BY Keyword ORDER BY Several Columns

This statement will select every user from the table called "users", and sort them in an ascending order by the "email" and the "username" columns:

SELECT * FROM users ORDER BY email, username;

This statement will select every user from the table called "users", and sort them in a descending order by the "email" and the "username" columns:

SELECT * FROM users ORDER BY email ASC, username DESC;