Excel Sortable Custom List - Sort by a List that you Create or Select

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You will often find yourself wanting to sort a spreadsheet based on something other than alphabetic or numeric order.  Look at the spread sheet below.  What if you wanted to sort this spreadsheet in order by Freshman, Sophmore, Junior and then Senior? You could create a custom list of Freshman, Sophmore, Junior, Senior and then sort on that custom list.

Create an Excel Custom List

To create a Custom List you need to perform the following steps:

1. Select the data to be sorted.  (In this example that would be the range A1:E9)
2. Click on the ribbon's Data tab
3. In the Sort & Filter group click on the Sort button
   

   

4. From the Order drop down box select Custom List
   

   

5. Notice that Excel has already created some Custom lists for days of the week and months of the year.
   Enter Freshman Sophmore Junior Senior on separate lines in the List entries list box.
   Click on the Add button. The list you created should now appear in the Custom lists
   Click on the Ok button.
   

   

   The classes should now appear in the Order drop down box.
   

   

6. Click on the down arrow for the Order drop down box.
   You can decide to sort the classes as you entered them or in reverse order.

   

7. A.  Since the headings in the table are selected you should select My data has headers.
   B.  Select the row header for the column you want to sort by, which in this example is Class.
   C. Select Freshman, Sophmore, Junior, Senior from the Order drop down box.
   D. Click on the OK button.

   

   The spreadsheet is now sorted in Class order.