Select the top N values by group

dplyr does the trick

mtcars %>% 
arrange(desc(mpg)) %>% 
group_by(cyl) %>% slice(1:2)


 mpg   cyl  disp    hp  drat    wt  qsec    vs    am  gear  carb
  <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl>
1  33.9     4  71.1    65  4.22 1.835 19.90     1     1     4     1
2  32.4     4  78.7    66  4.08 2.200 19.47     1     1     4     1
3  21.4     6 258.0   110  3.08 3.215 19.44     1     0     3     1
4  21.0     6 160.0   110  3.90 2.620 16.46     0     1     4     4
5  19.2     8 400.0   175  3.08 3.845 17.05     0     0     3     2
6  18.7     8 360.0   175  3.15 3.440 17.02     0     0     3     2

This seems more straightforward using data.table as it performs the sort while setting the key.

So, if I were to get the top 3 records in sort (ascending order), then,

require(data.table)
d <- data.table(mtcars, key="cyl")
d[, head(.SD, 3), by=cyl]

does it.

And if you want the descending order

d[, tail(.SD, 3), by=cyl] # Thanks @MatthewDowle

Edit: To sort out ties using mpg column:

d <- data.table(mtcars, key="cyl")
d.out <- d[, .SD[mpg %in% head(sort(unique(mpg)), 3)], by=cyl]

#     cyl  mpg  disp  hp drat    wt  qsec vs am gear carb rank
#  1:   4 22.8 108.0  93 3.85 2.320 18.61  1  1    4    1   11
#  2:   4 22.8 140.8  95 3.92 3.150 22.90  1  0    4    2    1
#  3:   4 21.5 120.1  97 3.70 2.465 20.01  1  0    3    1    8
#  4:   4 21.4 121.0 109 4.11 2.780 18.60  1  1    4    2    6
#  5:   6 18.1 225.0 105 2.76 3.460 20.22  1  0    3    1    7
#  6:   6 19.2 167.6 123 3.92 3.440 18.30  1  0    4    4    1
#  7:   6 17.8 167.6 123 3.92 3.440 18.90  1  0    4    4    2
#  8:   8 14.3 360.0 245 3.21 3.570 15.84  0  0    3    4    7
#  9:   8 10.4 472.0 205 2.93 5.250 17.98  0  0    3    4   14
# 10:   8 10.4 460.0 215 3.00 5.424 17.82  0  0    3    4    5
# 11:   8 13.3 350.0 245 3.73 3.840 15.41  0  0    3    4    3

# and for last N elements, of course it is straightforward
d.out <- d[, .SD[mpg %in% tail(sort(unique(mpg)), 3)], by=cyl]

Just sort by whatever (mpg for example, question is not clear on this)

mt <- mtcars[order(mtcars$mpg), ]

then use the by function to get the top n rows in each group

d <- by(mt, mt["cyl"], head, n=4)

If you want the result to be a data.frame:

Reduce(rbind, d)

Edit: Handling ties is more difficult, but if all ties are desired:

by(mt, mt["cyl"], function(x) x[rank(x$mpg) %in% sort(unique(rank(x$mpg)))[1:4], ])

Another approach is to break ties based on some other information, e.g.,

mt <- mtcars[order(mtcars$mpg, mtcars$hp), ]
by(mt, mt["cyl"], head, n=4)