MySQL ORDER BY Keyword

MySQL Tutorial

🔢 MySQL ORDER BY Keyword 

The ORDER BY keyword in MySQL is used to sort the result set of a query in ascending or descending order.

👉 It is widely used in reports, rankings, pagination, and interviews.

1️⃣ What is ORDER BY?

  • Sorts rows based on one or more columns

  • Default sorting is ascending

  • Affects only the result, not stored data

📌 Sorting can be done on numbers, strings, and dates.

2️⃣ Basic Syntax


3️⃣ ORDER BY ASC (Ascending – Default) ⭐


✔ Lowest marks first
✔ ASC is optional

4️⃣ ORDER BY DESC (Descending) ⭐


✔ Highest salary first
✔ Very common in Top-N queries

5️⃣ ORDER BY Multiple Columns ⭐


📌 First sorts by department,
📌 then sorts salary inside each department

6️⃣ ORDER BY with Column Position ❓


📌 Sorts by 2nd column (marks)
⚠️ Not recommended (less readable)

7️⃣ ORDER BY with Alias ⭐


✔ Alias can be used in ORDER BY

8️⃣ ORDER BY with WHERE


📌 WHERE filters rows before sorting

9️⃣ ORDER BY with GROUP BY ⭐


✔ Sorts grouped results

🔟 ORDER BY with LIMIT (Very Important)


✔ Top 5 highest salaries
✔ Very common interview question

1️⃣1️⃣ ORDER BY with NULL Values

  • ASC → NULLs come first

  • DESC → NULLs come last


1️⃣2️⃣ ORDER BY vs GROUP BY ⭐ (Interview)

Feature ORDER BY GROUP BY
Purpose Sorting Grouping
Affects Result order Aggregation
Aggregate functions ❌ No ✔ Yes

1️⃣3️⃣ Common Mistakes ❌

❌ Expecting ORDER BY to store sorted data
❌ Forgetting ASC/DESC meaning
❌ Using column position blindly
❌ Confusing ORDER BY with GROUP BY

📌 Interview Questions & MCQs (Very Important)

Q1. What does ORDER BY do?

A) Groups rows
B) Filters rows
C) Sorts rows
D) Deletes rows

✅ Answer: C

Q2. Default order of ORDER BY?

A) DESC
B) RANDOM
C) ASC
D) NULL

✅ Answer: C

Q3. Can ORDER BY use column alias?

A) Yes
B) No

✅ Answer: A

Q4. Which clause is executed last?

A) WHERE
B) GROUP BY
C) ORDER BY
D) HAVING

✅ Answer: C

Q5. Which query gives top 3 salaries?

SELECT * FROM employees
ORDER BY salary DESC
LIMIT 3;

A) Correct
B) Incorrect

✅ Answer: A

Q6. Can ORDER BY sort by multiple columns?

A) Yes
B) No

✅ Answer: A

🔥 Real-Life Use Cases

✔ Ranking students/employees
✔ Leaderboards
✔ Latest records first
✔ Pagination sorting
✔ Reports & dashboards

✅ Summary

  • ORDER BY sorts query results

  • Default order is ASC

  • Supports multiple columns

  • Works with aliases & LIMIT

  • Essential for ranking & pagination

  • Very important for SQL exams & interviews

You may also like...