How do i sort a multi dimensional array in php?

This solution is for usort() with an easy-to-remember notation for multidimensional sorting. The spaceship operator <=> is used, which is available from PHP 7.

usort($in,function($a,$b){
  return $a['first']   <=> $b['first']  //first asc
      ?: $a['second']  <=> $b['second'] //second asc
      ?: $b['third']   <=> $a['third']  //third desc (a b swapped!)
      //etc
  ;
});

Examples:

$in = [
  ['firstname' => 'Anton', 'surname' => 'Gruber', 'birthdate' => '03.08.1967', 'rank' => 3],
  ['firstname' => 'Anna', 'surname' => 'Egger', 'birthdate' => '04.01.1960', 'rank' => 1],
  ['firstname' => 'Paul', 'surname' => 'Mueller', 'birthdate' => '15.10.1971', 'rank' => 2],
  ['firstname' => 'Marie', 'surname' => 'Schmidt ', 'birthdate' => '24.12.1963', 'rank' => 2],
  ['firstname' => 'Emma', 'surname' => 'Mueller', 'birthdate' => '23.11.1969', 'rank' => 2],
];

First task: Order By rank asc, surname asc

usort($in,function($a,$b){
  return $a['rank']      <=> $b['rank']     //first asc
      ?: $a['surname']   <=> $b['surname']  //second asc
  ;
});

Second task: Order By rank desc, surname asc, firstmame asc

usort($in,function($a,$b){
  return $b['rank']      <=> $a['rank']       //first desc
      ?: $a['surname']   <=> $b['surname']    //second asc
      ?: $a['firstname'] <=> $b['firstname']  //third asc
  ;
});

Third task: Order By rank desc, birthdate asc

The date cannot be sorted in this notation. It is converted with strtotime.

usort($in,function($a,$b){
  return $b['rank']      <=> $a['rank']       //first desc
      ?: strtotime($a['birthdate']) <=> strtotime($b['birthdate'])    //second asc
  ;
});

Definition

This page explains how to sort a multidimensional array in PHP. This frequently happens when the array is the result of a database query.

The example array

Let's considere the following multidimensional array:

$array[] = array('name' => 'Dupont', 'age' => 72);
$array[] = array('name' => 'Albert', 'age' => 11);
$array[] = array('name' => 'Durand', 'age' => 56);
$array[] = array('name' => 'Michel', 'age' => 52);
$array[] = array('name' => 'Dupont', 'age' => 36);
$array[] = array('name' => 'Plutot', 'age' => 27);

Sort by name ascending

We have an array of rows, but array_multisort() requires an array of columns, so we use the below code to obtain the columns, then perform the sorting.

$columns = array_column($array, 'name');
array_multisort($columns, SORT_ASC, $array);

Here is the result:

Sort by age descending

$columns = array_column($array, 'age');
array_multisort($columns, SORT_DESC, $array);

Here is the result:

Sort by name ascending, then by age descending

$columns_1 = array_column($array, 'name');
$columns_2 = array_column($array, 'age');
array_multisort($columns_1, SORT_ASC, $columns_2, SORT_DESC, $array);

Here is the result:

See also

• Add icons on your web pages
• CSS color table
• CSS styles for Rainbow code highlighter
• How to detect ad blockers on web sites?
• HTML drop-down list of citizenships.
• HTML five stars ranking
• How Bézier curves are described in SVG paths
• How to check if a number is prime in JavaScript
• How to get list of subdirectories in PHP
• How to slugify a string in JavaScript?
• How to slugify a string in PHP?
• In PHP, how to convert a date in French?
• Levenshtein distance in mySQL
• List of supported languages by Prism syntax highlighter
• Nice HTML checkbox
• PHP array of countries and citizenships.
• Pure CSS loader
• Replace HTML checkbox with images
• Simple SSE in PHP
• Sessions or cookies?

Last update : 11/25/2021

How do I sort a multidimensional array in PHP?

Can we sort multidimensional array?

How do you sort a multidimensional list?

How do you sort a multidimensional array by an inner key?