What is ORDER BY?

The ORDER BY clause is used to sort query results.

You can sort data by names, salary, dates, numbers, and grouped results.

How ORDER BY works

ORDER BY is usually written at the end of the query.

SELECT
    column_name
FROM table_name
ORDER BY column_name;

Example

SELECT
    employee_name,
    department,
    salary
FROM Employees
ORDER BY salary;

Example table

We will sort this Employees table using ORDER BY.

Sorting low to high

Use ASC to sort values in ascending order. For numbers, this means low to high.

SELECT
    employee_name,
    department,
    salary
FROM Employees
ORDER BY salary ASC;

Result

Sorting high to low

Use DESC to sort values in descending order. For numbers, this means high to low.

SELECT
    employee_name,
    department,
    salary
FROM Employees
ORDER BY salary DESC;

Result

Key takeaway