Thread: How Sort out the Excel

To see how much is being spent in each category we'll group the items. Click anywhere in column A. Under the Home tab, click the Sort & Filter tool. Select Sort A to Z. In older versions of Excel choose Sort from the Data menu, then choose Sort by Trade, Ascending. Now all the items in each category are grouped together. Click in column A again. Click the Data tab and the Subtotal tool, or in older versions of Excel choose Subtotals from the Data menu. Click OK to simply accept the default subtotal settings.

In the process of inserting subtotals, Excel will also create what it calls an Outline. This means there are three little numbers to the left of the column headings: 1,2 and 3. Click on 1 and everything but the grand total is concealed. Click on 2 and only the subtotals are shown. Click on 3 and the whole table will appear again .
If the grand total seems a little high for the intended budget we can rearrange the data to see where the most money is presently spent.



Click any cell in column A, then click the Subtotal tool (in older versions pick Subtotals from the data menu) and in the Subtotal dialogue box click the Remove All button. Click in column C. Under the Home tab click Sort & Filter and choose Sort Largest to Smallest (in older versions choose Sort from the data menu then Price, Descending). This will sort the table so the most expensive items are clearly shown at the top of the list.