Sorting Data in Reports

Information can be easier to understand when it appears in an intentional order. Applying a sort order to one or more data items in the designer enables you to arrange rows and columns in tables and axis labels on charts in some order, such as alphabetically or highest to lowest numerically. Interactively changing the order of data can provide you with a different perspective that often facilitates valuable insight. For example, in a report, sales employees who are initially arranged alphabetically can be re-sorted by sales amount.

Ranking can help reduce the amount of visible data and is often used in combination with sorting. For more information, see Adding a New Rank.

To sort values in a list table, right-click on a column heading and select Sort. Then, select either Ascending or Descending.

To sort by category or measure values in a crosstab, right-click on a column or row heading, and select Sort. Then, select either Ascending or Descending.

You can also sort categories, rather than measures, by clicking the category name.

To sort by values in a graph, right-click on a measure name or category name, and select Sort. Then, select either Ascending or Descending.