How to Filter Data in Excel?

Dealing with the large scale of data sometimes, it becomes very challenging for us to focus on some specific set of data or the data you are interested in. Well, Excel provides us with the facility to Filter data to narrow down the large scale of data which eases us to study the data of our interest.

In this section, we will discuss the method of adding the filter to the data. Further, we will discuss the steps to filter data and will also explore the steps to apply text filters or number filters. We will talk about applying a filter to multiple columns and finally, we will discuss the method to clear filter and remove the filter.

1. Add/Create Filter
2. Apply Filter
3. Filter Number & Text
4. Filter Multiple Columns
5. Clear Filter
6. Remove Filter

Steps to Filter Data in Excel 2016:

Add Filter

Step 1: Select a cell in the range where your data is placed to which you want to add a filter.

Step 2: In the Data tab under the Sort & Filter group you have a Filter option click that filter icon.

The filter will get added to the header of every column as you can see in the image below.

Filter Data

Step 1: Select a drop-down button of the filter which will display a window. At the bottom of the window, you can check the data in which you are interested and uncheck the data in which you are not interested. And click OK.

In the image below, you can observe that only the filtered data is being displayed and the rest of the data got hidden. This is temporary hiding only. So, it becomes easy to study a specific set of data.

You can see that the entire row containing the filtered data is displayed.

Filter Text and Number

Text Filters

Step1: Click the drop-down button of the filter which has all text entries and the window displayed will show an option of Text Filters which further provide some option for filtering. Like, you can filter the text, which is equal to some text (provided by the user) or not equal to some text or which begins with or ends with, which contains or does not contains the provided data.

You can even customize your filtration as you can see in the image below.

I want to filter only those text which is equal to Davis Clawson or Fred and the entire row containing this data would be displayed.

Number Filters

Step 1: Click the drop-down button of the filter having number entries only. The displayed window will show an option of Number Filters which further provides the option of filtering the number equal to provided number or numbers which is greater than/less than, between, above average or below average the provided number.

You can even customize the filtration. Like I want to filter only those staff whose sales are less than 212.

As you can observe in the image below, data of only those staff is displayed whose sales are below 212.

Filter Multiple Columns

To apply a filter to multiple columns you just have to apply filtration to the specific columns separately. As in the image below you can observe that I have applied the filter to Staff and Sales individually.

Clear Filter

You can clear the filter of any data only if you have applied a filter to it earlier. Like, in the image below, you can see that I have applied the filter to Sales sometime earlier. Now, if you click the drop-down button of the applied filter, the displayed window will show the option of Clear Filter From “XYZ”.

As you will click this option the filter applied to the particular column will get cleared.

Remove Filter

To remove the filter over entire data just click on any cell in the range of data to which you have applied filter. Now, click on the Filter in the Sort & Filter group of Data tab.

So, this was all about the steps of adding or removing the filter. We have also learned to apply the filter. This eases you work while working with a large scale of data. Hope the content is useful. Keep reading.