How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

No doubt you’re familiar with the saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This is certainly true when you’re trying to present or explain data.

Graphs and charts are a great way to make technical or statistical data more easily digestible.

You can present data with tables, but if you want people to try and interpret complex data with numbers, percentages and comparisons easily, then charts and graphs are perfect for helping them interpret your information.

Charts and graphs help you explain complex data so your audience can more easily interpret it!

Need to add charts or graphs to your WordPress pages? This tutorial shows you how to use the WP Visualizer plugin – a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that lets you create, manage and embed great-looking charts and graphs into your WordPress posts and pages in a few mouse clicks that:

• Your web visitors can interact with
• Allows you to add data from your hard drive or a web-based source of data
• Is fully responsive for mobile browsers

If you are displaying visual data like pie charts, comparison charts or trending graphs containing static information (e.g. historical data), an easier way to display this information is to create your charts or graphs using an image editing application, convert these into jpg or png images and then simply insert the image into your posts or pages.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to add dynamic bars and pie graphs to your WordPress posts with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.

Fortunately, there is a plugin for WordPress that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create great-looking and interactive charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with updatable information.

Visualizer

Plugin URL

You can install the plugin in your WordPress dashboard (see further below), or access and download the WordPress Visualizer plugin here:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Description

WP Visualizer is an easy-to-use and powerful WP plugin that lets you create, manage and insert eye-catching charts into your WordPress posts and pages in a few simple steps.

Visualizer uses Google Visualization API to render charts, which support cross-browser compatibility (adopting VML for older IE versions) and cross-platform portability to iOS and new Android releases, and are based on pure HTML5/SVG technology (adopting VML for old IE versions), so no extra plugins or add-ons are needed.

WordPress Visualizer also comes with a variety of built-in that are optimized to address your data visualization needs, including:

• Line chart
• Area chart
• Bar chart
• Column chart
• Pie chart
• Geo chart
• Gauge chart
• Candlestick chart
• Scatter chart

WordPress Visualizer is also flexible and customizable, allowing you to use Google Chart Tools with their default setting, or configure an extensive set of options to match the look and feel of your website. Various options are available for each chart that let you fully customize their look.

Additionally, charts are rendered using HTML5/SVG technology to provide cross-browser compatibility (including VML for older IE versions) and cross-platform portability to iPhones, iPads and Android devices. Your visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile devices without requiring the installation of any extra software.

Plugin Installation

From your WordPress admin area, select Plugins > Add New from the navigation sidebar menu …

In the Add Plugins page type “visualizer” into the search field and click enter …

Locate Visualizer in the search results area and click the “Install Now” button …

Click OK to proceed …

Activate the plugin …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins area …

Once the plugin has been activated, click on Library …

You can also get to the plugin’s ‘library’ screen by selecting Media > Visualizer Library in your dashboard menu …

This takes you to the plugin’s Visualizer Library settings …

When you first install the plugin, this section will be empty.

Your next step is to add the charts and graphs to your library that you will want to publish to your posts or pages.

How To Configure Visualizer

To add a new chart or graph to the library, click on ‘Add New’ …

A visual gallery displaying all the different types of graphs available will load on your screen.

Select the type of graph or chart you would like to create and click on the ‘Next’ button …

The selected graph/chart type will open up in a lightbox.

The next step is to upload a CSV file that contains all the data you want to populate your chart or graph with …

When creating your CSV data file, ensure that:

• The first row contains the column headings.
• Your second row includes the series type (e.g. number, datetime, etc.)

The screenshot below shows how to format your data as explained above …

If you are unsure about how to format your CSV file, just study the sample file supplied with the plugin.

Once you have done this, select the data source (‘From Computer’ or ‘From Web’) in the ‘Upload CSV File’ section.

Upload CSV File From Computer

To upload a CSV file from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

Locate and select your data file and click on ‘Open‘ …

The plugin will import the data from the CSV file and display it using the graph/chart type you have chosen …

Upload CSV File From The Web

To learn how to create, save and publish data to a Visualizer chart or graph using Google Spreadsheet, see the article below:

• How To Populate Data Using Google Spreadsheet

After importing your data, check that all of the information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a data file containing the correct data), and then click ‘Next‘ …

Depending on the chart or graph type you’ve picked, the plugin displays a range of customization options …

The plugin gives you complete control of your information, and updates your display in real time …

For example, the pie chart offers many configurable options, such as:

• General Settings – Configure settings for the chart’s title, font styles, tooltip, and legend.
• Pie Settings – Create 3D pie charts, draw slices counterclockwise, set the text content displayed on the slice, create a “donut” pie chart, rotate the chart’s “start” angle and set the slice border color.
• Residue Settings – Set the ‘Visibility Threshold’ (the slice relative part, below which a slice will not show individually.), ‘Residual Slice Label’ (the label for the combination slice that holds all slices below slice visibility threshold, e.g. “Other”), and ‘Residue Slice Color’.
• Slice Settings – Customize the ‘Slice Offset’ (how far to separate the slice from the rest of the pie), and ‘Slice Color’.
• Layout & Chart Area – Configure the layout (total size of chart) including the width and height of the chart as a number of percentage, background color for the main area of the chart and the chart border width and color, and the placement and size of the chart area (where the chart itself is drawn, excluding axis and legends).

Once you’re happy with the way your graph or chart is looking, click Create Chart …

The new graph or chart will now be added to your ‘Visualizer Library’ section …

Note that each new element is given a unique ID displayed in a shortcode. As you will see in just a moment, this allows you to easily embed charts and graphs into your content …

Graphs and charts added to the Visualizer Library can be accessed by type …

After an element has been added to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit it, clone it, or trash it …

Visualizer Usage

After you’ve created a new graph or chart and added it to the Library, adding it to a post or page is really very simple.

First, create a new post or page (or open an existing one) …

Next, place your mouse cursor where you would like to insert your visual element into the content and click on the ‘Add Media‘ button …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

Select the chart or graph you want to add to your content and click the “insert” icon …

This inserts a shortcode into your content …

Once you have finished adding the shortcode, click on Publish to publish (or update) your page or post …

After publishing your post, click ‘View post’ to see the results …

You will see the chart in your content …

As mentioned previously, the plugin also displays responsive visual elements for mobile device viewers …

As you can see, WordPress Visualizer allows you to insert and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can update your data and the changes will automatically be reflected throughout your website. This makes working with interactive chart information in WordPress very efficient.

The developers of this plugin have created a series of step-by-step tutorials you can use to learn how to edit, customize and use Visualizer.

For additional tutorials on editing, copying, deleting and adding data to your charts, refer to the site below:

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to easily insert attractive and interactive charts and graphs into WordPress with WordPress Visualizer.

***

***