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How to sort each row alphabetically and individually at once?

Supposing you have a range of data, and now you want to sort each row alphabetically and individually as below screenshot shown, how can you solve it? In this article, I will introduce some methods and trick on handling this job in Excel quickly.
doc sort each row 1

Sort each row alphabetically one by one with Sort function

Sort each row alphabetically quickly with formulas


arrow blue right bubble Sort each row alphabetically one by one with Sort function

To sort each row alphabetically and individually, you can apply Sort function and choose Sort left to right option and then sort them one by one.

1. Select the first row you want to sort alphabetically, and click Data > Sort, and in the popping Sort Warning dialog, check Continue with the current selection option, and click the Sort button. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 2

2. Then in the Sort dialog, click Options to open Sort Options dialog, and check Sort left to right. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 3

3. Then click OK to go back to Sort dialog, and select the row number you want to sort first in the Row drop down list, and then specify Sort On and Order as you need. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 4

4. Click OK. You can find the first row you selected has been sorted from smallest to largest. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 5

5. Repeat above 1-4 steps to sort other rows one by one. And now each row has been sorted alphabetically and individually.


arrow blue right bubble Sort each row alphabetically quickly with formulas

If there are hundreds of rows needed to be sorted individually, above method are time-wasted. Here I introduce some formulas for you to quickly sort each row individually from smallest to largest or vice versa.

1. Select a blank cell next to the rows you want to sort, F2 for instance, enter this formula =SMALL($B2:$D2,1), and press Enter key. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 6

2. Then go to next cell, G2, enter this formula =SMALL($B2:$D2,2) and press Enter key. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 7

3. In cell M2, enter the formula =SMALL($B2:$D2,3) and press Enter key, now the first row has been sorted from smallest to largest. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 8

Tip: in above formulas, B2:D2 is the column cells in the row you want to sort, and 1, 2,3 indicate the first smallest, the second smallest, the third smallest, you can change them as you need.

4. And select the cells F2: H2 (the formula cells) and drag auto fill handle over the cells you need to use to sort the corresponding column cells. See screenshot:
doc sort each row 9

Now each row has been sorted individually, you can copy the formula cells and paste them as value to instead of the original value in the data range as you need.
doc sort each row 10

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Comments (7)
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This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
instead of using small function, you can use sort function.
ex. =SORT(C2:E2,1,1,TRUE)
and than you can drag and copy per row.
C2:E2 --> column to be sort
1 --> index
1 --> ascending
True --> sort by column
This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
I cannot thank you enough for this. I've watched youtube videos, read posts, and none of them seemed to understand how I needed to sort each row individually and instantly without also rearranging the others. I gathered two years worth of numeral data for a personal project and it was a big mess! Tens of thousands of rows! I needed the numbers separate in individual cells (originally they weren't, but thats a whole other story!), and now I also needed them in order per row! First I tried simply going row by row, copying, deleting, retyping, pasting; but it was TEDIOUS. Then I tried transposing the tables, sorting-by-ascending column, one by one copying the column, and repasting into a blank chart, then transposing the new chart and copying all, and then pasting back into the original chart; but again - TEDIOUS. Now I will just create an adjacent chart using the formula, copy, paste, DONE!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!! :) THANK YOUUUU :)
This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
AHA! - right! - I know WHAT i need to do - now I just need to learn how to write the blimming macro to: set up a do-while loop to trip down the rows until a blank entry is found (end of range):for each populated cell found; select first cell to be processed:Assign value of target cell to a variable: Insert temporary new first row>insert temp new column 'a': copy and paste value into cell A1; convert text to columns; select generated values; cut and paste special (transpose) into temp column A; sort column a in ascending order; insert a concatenation formula into the original cell to capture values in A1&A2&A3 etc; (probably using another loop to capture populated cell values) copy and paste special (values) into original cell; remove temp column: remove temp Row A: select next cell and repeat the loop. Sounds simple enough ...
This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
Great - now then: How can I sort multiple rows of TEXT values alphabetically - (something akin to the 'Small' function that will work with text values? - The sorting each row individually method works - but since I have over 6 thousand rows - and zero boredom threshold - I'm hoping that someone has managed to put together a formula solution (ideally) of a maco tool?
This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
Did you got the solution for particular issue, You are asking?
This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
Says you're going to show us how to sort alphabetically then you only use numbers.
This comment was minimized by the moderator on the site
The first method Sort each row alphabetically one by one with Sort function can sort each row alphabetically, the second one only work for numbers, thank u for ur message.
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