An AutoFilter is an Excel feature that lets you filter out records from a data list. You can select an AutoFilter option, and only records that meet the specified criteria will be shown.

Look at the following list carefully.

You will see that there are some duplicate values for some fields (i.e. three people named Bert).

If we wanted to only show the records for people named Bert, we could filter out the rest by clicking the auto filter arrow next to the Name column heading. If you don’t have auto filter arrows in your list, click on the column heading cell of your choice, or click on a cell in the list, and choose Data-> Filter->AutoFilter, from the Data menu.

(Data->Filter->AutoFilter will hide the AutoFilter drop lists if they are currently visible)

When you display the AutoFilter drop list, you will see the corresponding field values from your data list in ascending order.

Here is the AutoFilter drop list for the name field. Notice that each unique field entry is present in the list (you can have up to a thousand of these field entries accessible via the scroll bar).

If we select the entry Bert for our filter, only the records with Bert in the name field will be shown.

If you select the All option from the AutoFilter drop list, all of the data records will be shown with no filters applied. If you select the Top 10 option, a Top 10 dialogue box will appear.

You can configure the options in this box to display the top ten records according to value (from high to low) or as a percent (10 percent of the total amount of records in the list) by choosing items or percent.

You can increase or decrease the number of top items shown by clicking the arrows next to the number 10 in the center option box. You can also choose between top and bottom by selecting from the first option box. The top 10 filter only works with numerical values and dates.

If you select custom from the AutoFilter options, you will be able to set up a customized filter for your data list.