Sort Multidimensional Array in PHP

A common problem people face whilst coding with PHP is sorting Multidimensional arrays. Sorting an array with one level to is quite a simple task, however, sorting arrays that consist of many levels can be quite a challenge for some new developers. Here is one way in which we can make this daunting task seem a lot simpler. One short sorting function is all that is needed. It really couldnt be simpler to sort multidimensional arrays in PHP!

<?php
function aasort (&$array, $key) {
 $sorter=array();
 $ret=array();
 reset($array);
 
 foreach ($array as $ii => $va) {
 $sorter[$ii]=$va[$key];
 }
 asort($sorter);
 
 foreach ($sorter as $ii => $va) {
 $ret[$ii]=$array[$ii];
 }
 $array=$ret;
}
?>

The above function works really well and is also relatively quick at doing the sort. Here we’ll see an array get sorted using this function.

Array (
 [0] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Ben
 [Surname] => Saunders
 )
 [1] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Bob
 [Surname] => Ericsson
 )
 [2] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Allen
 [Surname] => Jones
 )
 [3] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Dean
 [Surname] => Williams
 )
 [4] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Josh
 [Surname] => Burley
 )
)

To sort the array by ‘Surname’ We do the following

<?php 
 aasort($your_array,"Surname");
?>

And the output

Array(
 [4] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Josh
 [Surname] => Burley
 )
 [1] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Bob
 [Surname] => Ericsson
 )
 [2] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Allen
 [Surname] => Jones
 )
 [0] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Ben
 [Surname] => Saunders
 )
 [3] => Array
 (
 [Name] => Dean
 [Surname] => Williams
 )
)

There you go, the struggles of sorting multidimensional arrays can be put behind you.

Author: Josh BurleyOver 10 years software and website development, more recently moving into app development. Became a founding member and managing partner of WebDesires in late 2014 early 2015. Now dedicate most of my time to the company and helping us grow into the industry.

Twitter Facebook Linkedin