Organising files

Sort By versus Group By

Updated 2026-07-31 · 3 min read

Finder has two stacked systems — grouping and sorting — and mixing them up is why views feel random.

Two systems

Group By (View → Group By, or the toolbar's circled icon) buckets the window into sections — Kind, Date, Size ranges. Sort By orders items *within* the window or within those groups (hold ⌥ and the Group By menu becomes Sort By).

Group By None + Sort By what-you-want is the predictable configuration; grouped views are where "why is it ordered like this" comes from.

The sorts that answer questions

Question	Sort
What just arrived?	Date Added, newest first
What was I working on?	Date Modified
What is eating space?	Size (needs Calculate all sizes for folders)
Where is that type?	Kind

Date Added vs Date Modified matters: a file downloaded today but written in 2019 tops the first and buries in the second. Downloads wants Date Added; project folders want Modified.

Per-folder memory

View settings are stored per folder (in .DS_Store). ⌘J → Use as Defaults sets your preferred view globally; Always open in … pins a specific folder's behaviour. When a folder's view seems haunted, ⌘J and reset it.

List view's extra columns

Right-click the column headers: add Date Added, Size, Kind, Tags. Click any header to sort by it — the fastest sort switch there is. Drag headers to reorder.

Keeping folders on top

Finder → Settings → Advanced → Keep folders on top when sorting by name — the setting Windows switchers miss most, in the place they least expect it.

Common questions

Why does Finder sort differently in different folders?

View settings are per-folder. ⌘J → Use as Defaults applies one configuration everywhere.

How do I sort inside groups?

Hold Option: the Group By menu turns into Sort By, controlling order within each group.