Sorting Orders on Your Board

A kanban board shows what work exists. A sorted kanban board shows what work to do first.

Three Sort Modes

Kanbanify gives you three ways to order the cards in each column, controlled from the sort menu in the board toolbar:

• ↓ Newest to oldest — cards are ordered by Shopify order date, most recent on top. This is the default.
• ↑ Oldest to newest — reverse chronological; oldest orders rise to the top. Useful for first-in-first-out workflows.
• ↑↓ Manual — you control the order. Cards stay exactly where you put them, and new orders land at the bottom until you position them.

Switching between modes is instant and doesn’t change any data. If you spend 10 minutes arranging cards in Manual mode, then switch to Newest to oldest to check something, your manual sequence is preserved. Switch back to Manual and everything returns to where you left it, aside from new orders.

The sort mode is a global view toggle. Everyone looking at the board sees the same sorting, so switching mode affects everyone else’s view too.

Manual Sorting

Open the sort menu in the board toolbar (next to the filter bar) and select Manual.

The board immediately switches to your saved manual order. If nobody has manually sorted anything yet, cards appear in their default date order, ready for you to start arranging.

There’s no “enable manual sorting” toggle in Settings — the menu option is always available. Switching to Manual mode is the only step.

Your orders fall into two groups:

• Positioned — you’ve dragged them to a specific spot. They sit in that exact position until you move them again.
• Unsorted — you haven’t touched them yet. They appear below all positioned cards, sorted by date (newest first) as a stable fallback. This means you don’t need to arrange your entire board at once: drag the important ones and the rest stay out of the way at the bottom.

New incoming orders always land as unsorted cards at the bottom of the first stage. They won’t disrupt your sequence — when you’re ready, drag them into place.

Visual Indicators

Once you start arranging, the board gives you clear visual feedback:

• Green insertion line — a dashed green line with a dot appears between cards during a drag to show the exact drop slot. On empty columns, a first-position target appears at the top.
• Fulfilled column rejection — the Fulfilled column is always date-sorted. If you drag a card over it, the column shows a non-accepting state and won’t let you drop. No error, no accidental fulfillment shuffling.
• Card badge — cards in Manual mode look identical to date-sorted cards. There’s no special badge or indicator on the card itself; the sort menu label tells you which mode you’re in.

Keyboard Reordering

Manual sorting has full keyboard support for moving cards up/down within the same stage:

1. Focus a card’s drag handle and press Enter to pick it up.
2. Use the arrow keys to move the insertion line up and down the column.
3. Press Enter again to drop the card at the chosen slot.
4. Press Escape to cancel and return the card to its original position.