# How to Sort by Date in Excel **URL:** https://www.compsmag.com/blogs/how-to-sort-by-date-in-excel/ **Author:** Ayushi Chauhan **Published:** 2022-01-19 **Updated:** 2022-01-19 **Categories:** Blogs **Tags:** Blogs Daily, guiderobert, Guides and Tutorials, guiding12, How To Guide, How To Guides, Tips, Tricks **Reading Time:** 7 min --- This tip is about the how to Sort by Date in Excel. So read this free guide, How to Sort by Date in Excel step by step. If you have query related to same article you may contact us. ## How to Sort by Date in Excel - Guide Excel provides a few different ways to sort your data by ascending or descending date. one of the most useful features in Excel is the ability to sort your data by date. Maybe you need to organize your family members' birth dates to send cards, sort your weekly budget transactions for the final of the year or track sales revenue by month. There are several ways to organize your entries by date. You can sort the data in ascending or descending order, and you can sort by day, week, month, or year. We'll walk you through all the different options below. ## How to Sort dates in a column If your only concern is sorting a column that contains dates, it's pretty simple. Suppose you have a dataset as shown below, where you only need to sort the dates in Column A. Below are the steps to sort this data based on date: Select the column that contains the dates you want to sort. On the Data tab you will find the 'Sort and Filter' group. This group offers several options for sorting the selected data. For a simple sort operation, you can click 'Sort Oldest to Newest' or 'Sort Newest to Oldest' depending on your need. You may be asked if you want to expand your selection to the other columns as well, or continue with the current selection. As we currently only want to sort the selected column, click on the second option. Click on Sort button. That's it, your selected column will be sorted from oldest to newest date or newest to oldest date according to the selected option. ## How to Sort data in multiple columns by date More realistically, you wouldn't want to sort just one column. You would be looking to sort multiple columns of data by date. Suppose you have a dataset as shown below, where you need to sort it based on the date in Column A. Below are the steps to sort multiple columns based on the date column: Select all the cells you want to sort. From the Data menu ribbon, select the 'Sort' option button (in the Sort and Filter group). This will open the Sort dialog box. In this dialog box, there are three drop-down lists. The first drop-down list allows you to select the column by which you want to sort the data. Make sure the column that contains your dates is selected. The second drop-down list lets you select what you want to sort. Make sure the “Value” option is selected for this. The third drop-down list lets you select what in the order you want to sort your dates (oldest to newest or newest to oldest). You can even create your own custom sort order. But let's leave that to someone else tutorial. Select the order in which you need your dates to be sorted Finally, click OK. This should sort your dates in ascending or descending order depending on what you specified. It must also move cells from the other columns along with their corresponding dates. ## What to do when Excel doesn't sort dates correctly If the above method didn't work and you find that your dates didn't sort as expected, it's likely that your dates were formatted as text instead of dates. Let's see what to do if that happens. ### Make sure your lines are in date format Below are the steps to check whether the dates you have are indeed in date format or not. Select the column that contains the dates you want to sort. Right-click the selected column and select Format Cells from the pop-up menu.up. On the Number tab, make sure Date is selected in the Category list. If not, be sure to select it. Then, in the Type list (on the left of the dialog box), make sure the format is the same as what you need. For example, in our case, we have dates in dd/mm/yy format. If not, change it to the required date format. click OK Now try sorting your data again using Sort button (on the Data tab). If you still don't find your data sorting correctly, it probably means that Excel is still not recognizing your date cells as dates. To verify that this is the case, do the following. In any blank cell, type '=ISTEXT(' and select any of the cells in the date column. Close the ')' bracket and press the Return key. The ISTEXT() function is used to find out whether a given cell has a text value or not. If Excel sees the value as a text value, you will get a TRUE result. If it sees the value as a date, you'll get a FALSE result. If you get a FALSE result, it means that even though you formatted the column cells as dates, Excel still sees them as text. Another way is to see how the contents of your cell are aligned. If your dates are all left-aligned, it means Excel sees your cells as text cells instead of dates. If I saw them as dates, I would have aligned the content to the right of the cell. To fix this issue, do the following. ### Convert your cells to date format using text to columns Below are the steps to use Text in Columns to convert text to date in Excel: Select the column that contains the dates you want to sort. On the Data tab, click Text to Columns (in the Data Tools group). This opens the Text to Columns dialog box. In this dialog box, you will see an option that allows you to specify whether the data in the selected cells is delimited. If you're not familiar with the term 'delimited', it's the character that specifies how data in cells are separated from each other, for example parts of your date are separated by a '/' symbol. That means the delimiter here is a '/' character. Make sure the 'Delimited' option is selected. Click Next In the next part of the dialog box, make sure all the check boxes are unchecked. This is because in your case the delimiter doesn't really matter. Click Next. This is the crucial part. In this part of the dialog, you can select your date format. select the radio button to the Date option (under Column Data Format). Next to this option, you'll see a drop-down list that lets you select what format your dates will be in. If your dates are in dd/mm/yy format as shown in our example, you can select the DMY option. There are many other options available, you can select the one you prefer. Finally, click Finish. To check whether your cells have been converted to dates or not, use the =ISTEXT() function once more. If this time you get a FALSE result, it means Excel now sees your cells as dates instead of text. ## Final note I hope you like the guide How to Sort by Date in Excel. In case if you have any query regards this article you may ask us. Also, please share your love by sharing this article with your friends. --- *End of Article*