list.sort

Puts a list in order.

Synopsis

items.sort()
items.sort(reverse=True)
sorted(items)

Description

items.sort() changes the list itself. sorted(items) leaves it alone and returns a new, sorted list.

Strings sort by character code, so capital letters come before lowercase ones.

Parameters

Return value

sort returns None. sorted returns a new list.

Example

nums = [3, 1, 2]
nums.sort()
print(nums)
nums.sort(reverse=True)
print(nums)
words = ["banana", "Apple", "cherry"]
print(sorted(words))
print(words)

It prints:

[1, 2, 3]
[3, 2, 1]
['Apple', 'banana', 'cherry']
['banana', 'Apple', 'cherry']

Common mistake

items = [3, "a", 1]
items.sort()

Python stops with:

TypeError: '<' not supported between instances of 'str' and 'int'

Python cannot say whether a number comes before a string. Keep one type per list.

See also

min, max, list.append

list.sort in the Python documentation