Alphabetizer · Free · Nothing uploaded
Alphabetize a List
To alphabetize a list, paste it with one item to a line and it comes back in A to Z order. This alphabetizer also files word by word, so New York comes before Newark, or letter by letter as some indexes do; sorts by last name past Jr. and van or de; and puts Room 2 before Room 10.
Chicago’s own nine-heading example comes out in Chicago’s order under both systems.
More options
Nothing typed yet. The list is kept in this browser only.
- Items in
- 0
- Items out
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- Duplicates removed
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- Blank lines left out
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Paste a list, one item to a line or separated by commas. It is sorted as you type, and the settings that decide where an item files are on the page, not guessed.
To alphabetize is to arrange items in alphabetical order, the order of the letters of the alphabet, comparing first letters and then each following letter in turn. Indexes and directories add rules for spaces, punctuation, numbers and names, filing either word by word or letter by letter.
- No sign-up
- Nothing uploaded
- Rules stated
- Works offline
- Word by word or letter by letter
Key facts
| Detail | Answer |
|---|---|
| Price | Free, no sign-up, nothing to install |
| Orders | A to Z, Z to A, shortest first, reversed, shuffled |
| Filing systems | Word by word (Chicago’s preference) or letter by letter |
| By last name | Suffixes passed over; capitalised particles join the surname |
| Numbers | By value, 2 before 10, or digit by digit |
| Alphabets | 11, by the browser’s Unicode collation |
| Input | One item to a line, commas, semicolons or tabs |
| Where the list is kept | This browser only |
How to alphabetize a list
Paste the list, choose how it files, copy the result.
Paste the list
One item to a line, or separated by commas. Numbers and bullets pasted with it are taken off.
Choose the order
A to Z is the default; Z to A, shortest first, reversed and shuffled are in the same list.
Choose word by word or letter by letter
Word by word keeps New York before Newark; letter by letter puts Newark first.
Sort names by last name if you need to
Set Sort by to Last name; tick Write names as Last, First to turn them round.
Set the rest under More options
The alphabet, what separates the items, duplicates, and how the result is written.
Copy the result
Copy the result puts the sorted list on your clipboard.
What people alphabetize
Any list someone else will search by eye, where the order is the index.
Reference lists and bibliographies
Entries by author’s surname, with suffixes and particles filed where a reader looks for them.
Book indexes and glossaries
Headings word by word or letter by letter, whichever the publisher’s style sets.
Class lists and registers
Pupils or members by last name, written Last, First.
Guest lists and seating plans
Names in order for a check-in desk, duplicates removed.
Libraries and collections
Titles with A, An and The skipped, as a catalogue files them.
Word lists and spelling
Vocabulary or spelling words in order, numbered for a test.
Directories and phone lists
Names with Mc and Mac together, as a phone book files them.
Inventories and tags
Items, keywords or tags in order, numbers by value.
Word by word or letter by letter: the two ways to file a list
Every alphabetizer in the search results compares a whole line one character at a time. That is one of two ways a list can be put in alphabetical order, and an index, a directory or a bibliography may need the other. The two systems are set out in The Chicago Manual of Style, the publishing reference used for book indexes:
Word by word. A space ends a word, and a shorter word files before a longer one that starts the same way. New York comes before Newark, because New is complete before Newark is. Chicago’s 18th edition (2024, paragraph 15.66) now prefers this system.
Letter by letter. Spaces are ignored and the letters are read straight through until a comma or a parenthesis. Newark comes before New York, because newa comes before newy. Chicago accepts it in a well-prepared index, and many dictionaries use it.
In both, hyphens, slashes, apostrophes and other punctuation are ignored, so new-age is filed as if it were newage. A comma or a parenthesis interrupts the comparison, and comes before anything that carries on: New, Aaron files before New Deal under either system.
| # | Word by word | Letter by letter |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | New, Aaron | New, Aaron |
| 2 | New Deal | new-age |
| 3 | New Hampshire | newborn |
| 4 | new to me | New Deal |
| 5 | new-age | “new-fangled” ideas |
| 6 | newborn | New Hampshire |
| 7 | “new-fangled” ideas | new/old |
| 8 | new/old | newt |
| 9 | newt | new to me |
The columns differ most where a heading has more than one word. Word by word, every heading that is just New followed by another word stays together at the top; letter by letter, New Deal and New Hampshire are spread among the single words beginning new. Pick the system once and keep it through the whole list: a list sorted half one way and half the other is the usual reason an index looks out of order when every entry is spelled correctly. Choose it under Filing on the tool.
Chicago’s 18th edition gives a second example: Chinese names with the surname first. Word by word, Li Boyuan and Li Chen stay together before Liang Ji; letter by letter, Liang Ji comes first, because lia comes before lib, and the two Li names end up after the Liang ones.
How each item is ordered: punctuation, capitals, numbers, The, accents
Behind the two filing systems, a handful of choices decide where each item lands. They are the ones that make two alphabetizers disagree about the same list, so here is each one, with a list typed into the tool and what came out:
| The rule | Typed in | Comes out |
|---|---|---|
| Word by word, a space ends a word | Newark · New York | New York · Newark |
| Letter by letter, the space is ignored | New York · Newark | Newark · New York |
| A parenthesis, then a comma, comes before a space | New Deal · New, Zelda · New (adj.) | New (adj.) · New, Zelda · New Deal |
| Hyphens, apostrophes, & and slashes are ignored | newborn · HMD · new-age · H&M | H&M · HMD · new-age · newborn |
| Capital letters do not change the order | banana · Cherry · Apple | Apple · banana · Cherry |
| Numbers by value | Room 10 · Room 2 · Room 1 | Room 1 · Room 2 · Room 10 |
| Numbers digit by digit (setting off) | Room 10 · Room 2 · Room 1 | Room 1 · Room 10 · Room 2 |
| A, An and The at the start are skipped | The Hague · Paris · Amsterdam | Amsterdam · The Hague · Paris |
| Accented letters, English | Zug · Örebro · Åland · Avesta | Åland · Avesta · Örebro · Zug |
| Accented letters, Swedish | Zug · Örebro · Åland · Avesta | Avesta · Zug · Åland · Örebro |
Letters are compared by your browser’s own collation for the alphabet you choose, the Unicode rules every modern browser carries. In English, accents and capitals do not change the order: Åland files with the As. Other languages have letters of their own. Swedish and Finnish put å, ä and ö after z; Danish and Norwegian put æ, ø and å there; Spanish files ñ after n; Turkish keeps dotted and dotless i apart. Pick the alphabet under More options. Where two items differ only in capitals, the capital comes first, so the order never changes from one sort to the next.
Numbers sort by value by default, so Room 2 comes before Room 10, which is what most people expect and what a computer’s plain sort gets wrong. Turn it off to see the digit-by-digit order a spreadsheet gives text, where 10 comes before 2. Digits come before letters either way. Style guides for references, MLA among them, file a title that starts with a number as if the number were spelled out, so 20 Poems goes under T; a tool cannot know how you would say every number, so type such an item spelled out, or move it after sorting.
A leading A, An or The is skipped, as libraries and indexes do with titles, so The Hague files under H. It stays in the item; only the place it is filed changes. Untick it under More options to file every word. Articles in other languages (Le, La, Der, El) are not skipped, because in many names they belong: Los Angeles files under L.
Alphabetizing by last name: suffixes, particles, and Mac and Mc
Set Sort by to Last name and each item is filed under its surname, whether it is typed First Last or Last, First. Three things decide which word is the surname, and every name alphabetizer that takes the last word gets them wrong:
Suffixes are not surnames. Jr., Sr., II, III, IV, PhD, MD and Esq. at the end are passed over, so Martin Luther King Jr. files under King, not Jr.
A capitalised particle is part of the surname. Martin Van Buren files under V, as Van Buren, Martin.
A lower-case particle stays with the given names. Simone de Beauvoir files under B, as Beauvoir, Simone de, which is the form Chicago’s own Q&A gives for an index. The particles recognised are van, von, de, der, den, du, da, di, la, le, del, della, des, dos, das, ter, ten, zu, bin and ibn.
| Typed | Filed under | Written Last, First |
|---|---|---|
| Martin Luther King Jr. | King | King, Martin Luther, Jr. |
| Simone de Beauvoir | Beauvoir | Beauvoir, Simone de |
| Vincent van Gogh | Gogh | Gogh, Vincent van |
| Ursula von der Leyen | Leyen | Leyen, Ursula von der |
| Martin Van Buren | Van Buren | Van Buren, Martin |
| de Gaulle, Charles | de Gaulle (typed with a comma, kept as typed) | de Gaulle, Charles |
Some names are filed by tradition rather than by rule. Chicago files Charles de Gaulle under D, because that is where readers look for him, and a person’s own usage comes first when it is known. An item that already has a comma is left exactly as typed, so type such a name the way it should be filed, de Gaulle, Charles, and it stays there. Tick Write names as Last, First to turn the rest round in the result, for a bibliography or a register.
Mac and Mc
Library catalogues, phone books and some British style guides, New Hart’s Rules among them, file Mc as if it were spelled Mac, so McDonald sits beside MacDonald. The Chicago Manual of Style and the international indexing standard ISO 999 file every name exactly as spelled, and so does this tool unless you tick File Mc as if spelled Mac. The name is never changed in the result; only its place is.
| # | As spelled (default) | Mc filed as Mac |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mabry | Mabry |
| 2 | MacDonald | MacDonald |
| 3 | Macey | McDonald |
| 4 | McDonald | Macey |
| 5 | McKay | McKay |
| 6 | Moore | Moore |
What this alphabetizer does not do
| It does | It does not |
|---|---|
| Sort a list word by word or letter by letter, A to Z or Z to A | Sort the columns of a spreadsheet, or keep a row together across columns: use the spreadsheet’s own sort |
| File names under the surname, past suffixes and particles | Know a person’s own preference, or a name filed by tradition: type those as Last, First |
| Skip A, An and The at the start | Skip articles in other languages, or spell out a number the way a style guide files it |
| Sort in eleven alphabets by the browser’s own collation | Sort scripts by pronunciation, such as Chinese by pinyin or Japanese by reading |
| Remove duplicates, blank lines, and numbers or bullets pasted with the list | Merge near duplicates, such as a name spelled two ways |
| Keep the list in this browser only | Send your list anywhere, or keep it after you clear it |
This alphabetizer, other online alphabetizers, Word or a spreadsheet
Four ways to put a list in order, and where each stops.
| This alphabetizer | Other online alphabetizers | Word’s Sort | Excel or Sheets A–Z | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Word by word or letter by letter | Either | Whole line only | No choice | No choice |
| Room 2 before Room 10 | Yes, by default | Some | No | No, for text |
| Last names | Suffixes and particles handled | The last word | Only if names are split into fields | Only in a separate column |
| Mc filed with Mac | As a setting | No | No | No |
| Skip A, An and The | Yes | Some | No | No |
| Where your list goes | Nowhere: this browser only | Usually the browser, sometimes a server | Your computer | Your computer, or the cloud |
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Frequently asked questions
How do I alphabetize a list?
Paste the list into the box with one item to a line, or separated by commas, and the sorted list appears below as you type. A to Z is the default. Choose word by word or letter by letter under Filing, set Sort by to Last name for a list of people, and press Copy the result.
What is the difference between word-by-word and letter-by-letter alphabetizing?
Word by word, a space ends a word and a shorter word files first, so New York comes before Newark. Letter by letter, spaces are ignored and the letters are read straight through, so Newark comes first. The Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition, prefers word by word and accepts either, as long as one system is used throughout.
How do I alphabetize by last name?
Set Sort by to Last name. Each name is filed under its surname whether it is typed First Last or Last, First. Suffixes such as Jr. and III are passed over, a capitalised particle joins the surname (Van Buren), and a lower-case one stays with the given names (Beauvoir, Simone de). Tick Write names as Last, First to turn them round.
Do numbers come before letters in alphabetical order?
In a sorted list, yes: digits file before letters. Here they sort by value, so 2 comes before 10; turn that off to get the digit-by-digit order a spreadsheet gives text, where 10 comes before 2. Style guides for references file a title starting with a number as if it were spelled out, which a tool cannot guess.
How do you alphabetize names that start with Mc or Mac?
Either exactly as spelled, so all the Mac names come before any Mc name, or with Mc filed as if it were Mac, so McDonald sits next to MacDonald. Chicago and the indexing standard ISO 999 file as spelled; library catalogues and phone books often put the two together. Tick File Mc as if spelled Mac for the second.
Does The count when alphabetizing a title?
Not by convention: a leading The, A or An is skipped, so The Hague files under H and A Tale of Two Cities under T. This tool does that by default and keeps the word in the item. Untick Skip A, An and The at the start to file every word, as you might for a list of phrases.
Can I alphabetize a comma-separated list?
Yes. Paste it on one line and the commas are read as separators. Choose Separated by commas under Write the result as to get it back in the same form. With Sort by set to Last name, a comma is read as part of a name such as de Gaulle, Charles, so put one name to a line, or choose Commas under Items are separated by.
Can it remove duplicates while sorting?
Yes. Tick Remove duplicates under More options. Items that differ only in capital letters or spacing count as the same, and the first one typed is kept; items with different accents are kept apart. The count removed is shown under the result, beside the blank lines left out.
Is my list uploaded?
No. The sorting happens in your browser with its own collation rules, and the list is kept in this browser’s storage on your device so a reload does not lose it. Nothing is sent anywhere. Clear removes it.
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