what is the difference between GROUP BY and ORDER BY in sql

When do you use which in general? Examples are highly encouraged!

I am referring so MySql, but can't imagine the concept being different on another DBMS

Solution 1:

ORDER BY alters the order in which items are returned.

GROUP BY will aggregate records by the specified columns which allows you to perform aggregation functions on non-grouped columns (such as SUM, COUNT, AVG, etc).

TABLE:
ID NAME
1  Peter
2  John
3  Greg
4  Peter

SELECT *
FROM TABLE
ORDER BY NAME

= 
3 Greg
2 John
1 Peter
4 Peter

SELECT Count(ID), NAME
FROM TABLE
GROUP BY NAME

= 
1 Greg
1 John 
2 Peter

SELECT NAME
FROM TABLE
GROUP BY NAME
HAVING Count(ID) > 1

=
Peter

Solution 2:

ORDER BY: sort the data in ascending or descending order.

Consider the CUSTOMERS table:

+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
| ID | NAME     | AGE | ADDRESS   | SALARY   |
+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
|  1 | Ramesh   |  32 | Ahmedabad |  2000.00 |
|  2 | Khilan   |  25 | Delhi     |  1500.00 |
|  3 | kaushik  |  23 | Kota      |  2000.00 |
|  4 | Chaitali |  25 | Mumbai    |  6500.00 |
|  5 | Hardik   |  27 | Bhopal    |  8500.00 |
|  6 | Komal    |  22 | MP        |  4500.00 |
|  7 | Muffy    |  24 | Indore    | 10000.00 |
+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+

Following is an example, which would sort the result in ascending order by NAME:

SQL> SELECT * FROM CUSTOMERS
     ORDER BY NAME;

This would produce the following result:

+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
| ID | NAME     | AGE | ADDRESS   | SALARY   |
+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
|  4 | Chaitali |  25 | Mumbai    |  6500.00 |
|  5 | Hardik   |  27 | Bhopal    |  8500.00 |
|  3 | kaushik  |  23 | Kota      |  2000.00 |
|  2 | Khilan   |  25 | Delhi     |  1500.00 |
|  6 | Komal    |  22 | MP        |  4500.00 |
|  7 | Muffy    |  24 | Indore    | 10000.00 |
|  1 | Ramesh   |  32 | Ahmedabad |  2000.00 |
+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+

GROUP BY: arrange identical data into groups.

Now, CUSTOMERS table has the following records with duplicate names:

+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
| ID | NAME     | AGE | ADDRESS   | SALARY   |
+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
|  1 | Ramesh   |  32 | Ahmedabad |  2000.00 |
|  2 | Ramesh   |  25 | Delhi     |  1500.00 |
|  3 | kaushik  |  23 | Kota      |  2000.00 |
|  4 | kaushik  |  25 | Mumbai    |  6500.00 |
|  5 | Hardik   |  27 | Bhopal    |  8500.00 |
|  6 | Komal    |  22 | MP        |  4500.00 |
|  7 | Muffy    |  24 | Indore    | 10000.00 |
+----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+

if you want to group identical names into single name, then GROUP BY query would be as follows:

SQL> SELECT * FROM CUSTOMERS
     GROUP BY NAME;

This would produce the following result: (for identical names it would pick the last one and finally sort the column in ascending order)

    +----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+   
    | ID | NAME     | AGE | ADDRESS   | SALARY   |
    +----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+
    |  5 | Hardik   |  27 | Bhopal    |  8500.00 |
    |  4 | kaushik  |  25 | Mumbai    |  6500.00 |
    |  6 | Komal    |  22 | MP        |  4500.00 |
    |  7 | Muffy    |  24 | Indore    | 10000.00 |
    |  2 | Ramesh   |  25 | Delhi     |  1500.00 |
    +----+----------+-----+-----------+----------+

as you have inferred that it is of no use without SQL functions like sum,avg etc..

so go through this definition to understand the proper use of GROUP BY:

A GROUP BY clause works on the rows returned by a query by summarizing identical rows into a single/distinct group and returns a single row with the summary for each group, by using appropriate Aggregate function in the SELECT list, like COUNT(), SUM(), MIN(), MAX(), AVG(), etc.

Now, if you want to know the total amount of salary on each customer(name), then GROUP BY query would be as follows:

SQL> SELECT NAME, SUM(SALARY) FROM CUSTOMERS
     GROUP BY NAME;

This would produce the following result: (sum of the salaries of identical names and sort the NAME column after removing identical names)

+---------+-------------+
| NAME    | SUM(SALARY) |
+---------+-------------+
| Hardik  |     8500.00 |
| kaushik |     8500.00 |
| Komal   |     4500.00 |
| Muffy   |    10000.00 |
| Ramesh  |     3500.00 |
+---------+-------------+

Solution 3: