Easy Filtering in Excel 2007

Last month you saw a quick way to filter for the selected item in a pivot table, and today you'll see a similar technique for a worksheet list in Excel 2007. (For the Excel 2003 quick filter instructions see AutoFilter By Selection in Excel)

In the screen shot below, there's a list on the worksheet, with office supply orders. The list isn't filtered, and it's not formatted as an Excel Table.

(Note: This technique will also work if the list is already filtered, or if it's formatted as an Excel Table.)

Filter for the Selected Item

To quickly focus on the Paper orders:

• Right-click on a "Paper" cell.
  
• In the popup menu, click Filter, and then click Filter by Selected Cell's Value.

An AutoFilter is automatically applied to the worksheet list, and column B is filtered for "Paper".

Clear the Column Filter

To see the full list again, you can clear the filter:

• Click the drop down arrow in the Column B heading cell.
  
• Click Clear Filter From 'Product'

Clear All the Filters

If you have more than one column filters, you can clear all the filters in a single click:

• On the Ribbon, click the Data tab
  
• In the Sort & Filter group, click Clear

Remove the Filter

To remove the AutoFilter completely from the worksheet list:

• On the Ribbon, click the Data tab
  
• In the Sort & Filter group, click Filter.

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