How to Sort Lines of Text

Online

The quickest way is the sort lines tool. Paste your lines, choose a method and copy the result. There are dedicated pages for alphabetical, reverse, numerical and length sorting.

Linux and macOS

sort file.txt        # alphabetical
sort -r file.txt     # reverse
sort -n file.txt     # numeric
sort -u file.txt     # sort and remove duplicates
sort -f file.txt     # ignore case

The sort command depends on your locale. Running it as LC_ALL=C sort uses plain character order, which puts capital letters before lowercase ones.

Windows PowerShell

Get-Content file.txt | Sort-Object
Get-Content file.txt | Sort-Object -Descending
Get-Content file.txt | Sort-Object { [int]$_ }

VS Code and Excel

In VS Code, open the Command Palette and run Sort Lines Ascending or Sort Lines Descending. In Excel, put one item per cell in a column and use Data, then Sort A to Z.

Python

lines = text.splitlines()
sorted(lines)               # alphabetical
sorted(lines, key=len)      # by length
sorted(lines, key=float)    # numeric, if every line is a number

Common mistakes

• Numbers sorted as text: 10 lands before 2 unless you sort numerically.
• Case surprises: some tools put all capitals first.
• Blank lines: empty lines sort to the top, so remove them first.
• Trailing spaces: invisible spaces change the order. Trim lines before sorting.