Google Sheets - How to Use Filters

Sometimes when working in a spreadsheet you want to see just some of your data that meets a certain criteria.  Many people will resort to either hiding cells or copying the information into another spreadsheet and deleting some of the data.  But there is a better solution for this - filters.

When looking at your spreadsheet, the filter is an icon of a funnel -

To use the filter, highlight the data you want to filter, then click on the filter icon.

This will cause the top row of data (which should be your header information) to turn color and add a little arrow next to each header -

Clicking on the arrow, you have several options.  The first is the ability to sort right there, in either direction -

The second is the powerful option.  It will have listed every entry choice for that field.  You can turn on and off the choices, so you can display exactly the data you want to see -

You can even set the parameters for multiple fields.  The arrows will turn to a funnel where you are using filters.

So, let's say I am viewing some district data and only want to see data from the English teachers in a specific building - I can do that quickly with filters.

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