Your boss wants you to sort the company's products by a new criterion, quality. You receive a list from your boss and now you have to sort products by this list, displayed in the above picture in cell range G3:G9.

This may seem to be a task that could take all week if you are working with a large list, however, Excel is great at these things. This task can easily be completed in under a minute.

Formula in cell F13:

The MATCH function finds the relative position of an item in the list made by your boss. You then simply sort the new list from small to large, see detailed instructions below.

MATCH(lookup_value, lookup_array, [match_type]

lookup_value: B3 is a relative cell reference. This cell reference changes when the formula is copied. Learn more about absolute and relative cell references:

lookup_array: Sheet2!$B$3:$B$9 is an absolute cell reference. It doesn't change when copied. You toggle cell references by selecting the cell reference in the formula bar and then press F4.

What happens in cell F13 when calculated?

MATCH(B3, Sheet2!$G$3:$B$G, 0)

becomes

MATCH("A", {"F"; "D"; "B"; "A"; "C"; "E"; "G"}, 0)

and returns 4 in cell F13. Value "A" has position four in the lookup_array {"F"; "D"; "B"; "A"; "C"; "E"; "G"}.

The third argument in the MATCH function determines if it should get an exact match (not case sensitive).

Copy formula

1. Select cell F13.
2. Copy cell F13 (Ctrl + c).
3. Select cell range F14:F19.
4. Paste (Ctrl + v).

Sort data

1. Press with right mouse button on on cell F13.
2. Press with left mouse button on Sort
3. Press with left mouse button on "Sort Smallest to Largest"
   

Get the Excel file

custom-sort.xlsx

Records category

Remove common records between two data sets
This article demonstrates how to filter records occurring in only one out of two Excel defined tables. It also shows […]

Filter shared records from two tables
I will in this blog post demonstrate a formula that extracts common records (shared records) from two data sets in […]

Unique distinct records sorted based on count or frequency
This article demonstrates how to sort records in a data set based on their count meaning the formula counts each […]

Sort values category

Sort a column alphabetically
Table of Contents Sort a column - Excel 365 Sort a column using array formula Two columns sorting by the […]

Extract a unique distinct list sorted from A to Z ignore blanks
This article demonstrates ways to extract unique distinct sorted from A to Z ignoring blanks, and based on a condition. […]

Sort dates within a date range
Array formula in D5: =SMALL(IF(($B$3:$B$12<=$E$3)*($B$3:$B$12>=$E$2), $B$3:$B$12, "A"), ROWS($A$1:A1)) How to create an array formula Copy array formula Select cell D5 […]

Excel categories

Leave a Comment