Sorting Worksheets in Excel using VBA

Imagine that you have a large file with 20 or more worksheets. It could be, for instance, a file with snapshot financial models for the companies in your coverage universe or a breakdown of home sales in different regions of the city.

You want to sort these worksheets into some kind of order that would allow you and your team to access your data more quickly. The SortSheets macro will help you to sort your sheet tabs into any kind of order or metric you want (e.g., alphabetically, by ranking, etc.) using the qsort algorithm (an explanation of the algorithm can be found here).

Exhibit 1A: A Sample File with Multiple Worksheets (Unsorted)

Exhibit 1B: A Sample File with Multiple Worksheets (Sorted)

Exhibit 2: SortSheets Macro (VBA)

Sub SwapSheets(S1 As Integer, S2 As Integer)
	Dim Sh1 As Worksheet, Sh2 As Worksheet
	Set Sh1 = Sheets(S1)
	Set Sh2 = Sheets(S2)
	Sh1.Move Before:=Sh2
	Sh2.Move Before:=Sheets(S1)
End Sub
Function QSortPartitionSheets(L As Integer, R As Integer, 
				Pvt As Integer) As Integer
	Dim PivotValue As String
	Dim SI As Integer, I As Integer
	PivotValue = Sheets(Pvt).Name
	SwapSheets Pvt, R
	SI = L
	For I = L To R - 1
		If Sheets(I).Name <= PivotValue Then
			SwapSheets I, SI
			SI = SI + 1
		End If
	Next
	SwapSheets SI, R
	QSortPartitionSheets = SI
End Function
Sub QSortSheets(L As Integer, R As Integer)
	Dim Pvt As Integer
	Dim NewPvt As Integer
	If R > L Then
		NewPvt = QSortPartitionSheets(L, R, L)
		QSortSheets L, NewPvt - 1
		QSortSheets NewPvt + 1, R
	End If
End Sub
Public Sub SortSheets()
	QSortSheets 1, Sheets.Count
End Sub

The code in Exhibit 2 allows you to sort your worksheets alphabetically. To sort by some other metric (e.g. ranking, regional sales numbers, etc.), simply change QSortPartitionSheets to use variants instead of strings, and define a function to lookup the value using the sheet name (as demonstrated in Exhibit 3).

Exhibit 3: Modified QSortPartitionSheets (VBA)

Function YourFunction(SheetName As String) As Variant
' ... Returns the ranking of the company, the sales number 
' of the region, etc.
End Function
Function QSortPartitionSheets(L As Integer, R As Integer, 
	Pvt As Integer) As Integer
	Dim PivotValue As Variant
	Dim SI As Integer, I As Integer
	PivotValue = YourFunction(Sheets(Pvt).Name)
	SwapSheets Pvt, R
	SI = L
	For I = L To R - 1
		If YourFunction(Sheets(I).Name) <= PivotValue Then
			SwapSheets I, SI
			SI = SI + 1
		End If
	Next
	SwapSheets SI, R
	QSortPartitionSheets = SI
End Function