ORDER BY

Introduction

By default, MySQL does not guarantee any particular order for the rows a query returns — they may come back in whatever order happens to be convenient for the database engine. When the order matters to you, the ORDER BY clause lets you control it explicitly.

In this lesson, you will learn how to sort results ascending or descending, and how to sort by multiple columns at once, using the same students table from previous lessons.

Basic ORDER BY Syntax

ORDER BY comes after WHERE (if there is one) and names the column to sort by.

SELECT column1, column2
FROM table_name
ORDER BY column1;

Here is the students table we will sort in the examples below.

Ascending Order (Default)

Ascending order means smallest to largest for numbers, or A-to-Z for text. It is the default, so ASC is optional — leaving it off has the exact same effect as writing it explicitly.

SELECT name, marks
FROM students
ORDER BY marks ASC;

+--------+-------+
| name   | marks |
+--------+-------+
| Jordan | 61    |
| Sam    | 74    |
| Maya   | 79    |
| Priya  | 88    |
| Alex   | 92    |
+--------+-------+

Descending Order

Descending order reverses the sort: largest to smallest, or Z-to-A. Add DESC right after the column name to use it.

SELECT name, marks
FROM students
ORDER BY marks DESC;

+--------+-------+
| name   | marks |
+--------+-------+
| Alex   | 92    |
| Priya  | 88    |
| Maya   | 79    |
| Sam    | 74    |
| Jordan | 61    |
+--------+-------+

Sorting by Multiple Columns

You can sort by more than one column by listing them separated by commas. The first column is the primary sort; the second column only breaks ties within groups of equal values in the first column.

SELECT name, grade
FROM students
ORDER BY grade ASC, name ASC;

+--------+-------+
| name   | grade |
+--------+-------+
| Alex   | A     |
| Priya  | A     |
| Maya   | B     |
| Sam    | B     |
| Jordan | C     |
+--------+-------+

Notice that within grade A, Alex comes before Priya because they are additionally sorted alphabetically by name. The same happens within grade B for Maya and Sam.

Worked Example

Suppose a teacher wants a class list grouped by grade, with students inside each grade listed alphabetically by name — exactly the query from above, applied for a real purpose.

SELECT name, grade, marks
FROM students
ORDER BY grade ASC, name ASC;

+--------+-------+-------+
| name   | grade | marks |
+--------+-------+-------+
| Alex   | A     | 92    |
| Priya  | A     | 88    |
| Maya   | B     | 79    |
| Sam    | B     | 74    |
| Jordan | C     | 61    |
+--------+-------+-------+

Each column can independently choose ASC or DESC. For instance, ORDER BY grade ASC, marks DESC would list grades alphabetically, but rank students within each grade from highest to lowest marks.

Common Mistakes

Best Practices

Frequently Asked Questions

Key Takeaways

Summary

ORDER BY gives you full control over how query results are sequenced, whether by a single column or by several columns working together to break ties.

Next, you will learn how to limit the number of rows a query returns using LIMIT — useful for pagination and "top N" style queries.