How to do alphanumeric sort in MongoDB?

You need to set numericOrdering: true for alphanumeric sort. Let us first create a collection with documents −

> db.alphanumericSortDemo.insertOne({"StudentId":"STU1010"});
{
   "acknowledged" : true,
   "insertedId" : ObjectId("5ccf149adceb9a92e6aa194c")
}
> db.alphanumericSortDemo.insertOne({"StudentId":"STU1101"});
{
   "acknowledged" : true,
   "insertedId" : ObjectId("5ccf14a2dceb9a92e6aa194d")
}
> db.alphanumericSortDemo.insertOne({"StudentId":"STU1901"});
{
   "acknowledged" : true,
   "insertedId" : ObjectId("5ccf14a9dceb9a92e6aa194e")
}
> db.alphanumericSortDemo.insertOne({"StudentId":"STU908"});
{
   "acknowledged" : true,
   "insertedId" : ObjectId("5ccf14aedceb9a92e6aa194f")
}
> db.alphanumericSortDemo.insertOne({"StudentId":"STU101"});
{
   "acknowledged" : true,
   "insertedId" : ObjectId("5ccf14b2dceb9a92e6aa1950")
}

Following is the query to display all documents from a collection with the help of find() method −

> db.alphanumericSortDemo.find().pretty();

This will produce the following output −

{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf149adceb9a92e6aa194c"), "StudentId" : "STU1010" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14a2dceb9a92e6aa194d"), "StudentId" : "STU1101" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14a9dceb9a92e6aa194e"), "StudentId" : "STU1901" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14aedceb9a92e6aa194f"), "StudentId" : "STU908" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14b2dceb9a92e6aa1950"), "StudentId" : "STU101" }

Case 1 − When you want the result in ascending order.

Here is the query to do alphanumeric sort in MongoDB −

> db.alphanumericSortDemo.find({}).sort({"StudentId" : 1}).collation( { locale: "en_US", numericOrdering: true });

This will produce the following output −

{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14b2dceb9a92e6aa1950"), "StudentId" : "STU101" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14aedceb9a92e6aa194f"), "StudentId" : "STU908" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf149adceb9a92e6aa194c"), "StudentId" : "STU1010" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14a2dceb9a92e6aa194d"), "StudentId" : "STU1101" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14a9dceb9a92e6aa194e"), "StudentId" : "STU1901" }

Case 2 − When you want the result in descending order.

Here is the query to do alphanumeric sort in MongoDB −

> db.alphanumericSortDemo.find({}).sort({"StudentId" : -1}).collation( { locale: "en_US", numericOrdering: true });

This will produce the following output −

{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14a9dceb9a92e6aa194e"), "StudentId" : "STU1901" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14a2dceb9a92e6aa194d"), "StudentId" : "STU1101" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf149adceb9a92e6aa194c"), "StudentId" : "STU1010" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14aedceb9a92e6aa194f"), "StudentId" : "STU908" }
{ "_id" : ObjectId("5ccf14b2dceb9a92e6aa1950"), "StudentId" : "STU101" }