How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress
You’ve heard the old adage “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This is certainly true when you are trying to present and explain complex information.
Using graphs and charts is great for making statistical data and information a lot easier to digest.
You can use tables to present data, but if you want people to try and interpret complex data with numbers, percentages and relationships quickly, then graphs and charts are perfect for helping them interpret the information.
Graphs and charts help present complex information so people can more easily interpret it!
Need to add charts and graphs to your WordPress posts and pages? This step-by-step tutorial shows you how to use WP Visualizer – a simple, easy to use and powerful WordPress plugin that allows you to create, manage and insert colorful and interactive graphs and charts into your WordPress posts and pages with a few simple steps that:
- Your web visitors can engage with
- Lets you add data from your hard drive or a web-based data source
- Will resize dynamically for mobile viewers
If you plan to display visual data like pie charts, comparison data or trending graphs containing static information (e.g. historical data), a simple method you can use to add your data is to create your graphs or charts using a desktop application, convert these into jpg or png images and then simply insert the images into your posts or pages.
Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins
If you want to easily add interactive bars and graphs to WordPress with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.
Fortunately, there is a great free plugin for WordPress users that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create great-looking and dynamic graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with updatable information.
Visualizer Plugin For WordPress
Visualizer URL
You can install the plugin in your WordPress dashboard (see further down the page), or download WordPress Visualizer from the link below:
http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer
Visualizer Plugin Description
WordPress Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful plugin that lets you create, manage and insert great-looking and interactive charts and graphs into your WordPress posts and pages with a few simple steps.
WordPress 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 additional components are required.
Visualizer also comes with a variety of built-in optimized for all 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 your web design. Several options are available for each chart that let you fully customize their look and feel.
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 web browsers without having to install any extra software.
How To Install The Visualizer Plugin
Inside your WordPress administration area, select Plugins > Add New from the navigation sidebar menu …
In the Add Plugins screen type in search for “visualizer” and hit enter …
Locate the item in the search results section and click the “Install Now” button …
Click OK to continue …
Activate the plugin …
You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins area …
Once the plugin has been activated, click on Library …
You can get to the plugin’s ‘library’ screen by selecting Media > Visualizer Library in your main menu …
This brings up the plugin’s Visualizer Library options …
When you first install the plugin, the library contains no charts.
The next step is to add add charts and graphs to the library.
How To Configure The Visualizer Plugin
To add a new chart or graph to the plugin’s library, click on the Add New button …
A page will appear on your browser displaying all the different types of charts available.
Select the type of chart or graph you would like to create and click on the ‘Next’ button …
The graph/chart type will pop up in a new window.
The next step is to upload a CSV file with your data …
When creating your CSV data file, ensure that:
- Your first row includes your column headings.
- Your second row contains the series type (e.g. boolean, datetime, etc.)
The screenshot below shows how to format your data as required …
If you are unsure about how to format your data CSV, just download the sample CSV file that comes with the plugin.
Next, select the data source (‘From Computer’ or ‘From Web’) in the ‘Upload CSV File’ section.
Upload CSV File From Computer
To upload the CSV file and data from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …
Use the browser to locate and select your data file and click on ‘Open‘ …
The plugin will now import your 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, go here:
After importing the data, make sure that all of the information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a new data file with the correct data), and click ‘Next‘ …
Depending on the chart or graph type you have selected, the plugin displays various customization options and settings …
Visualizer gives you complete control of your chart or graph, and updates your display in real time …
For example, the pie chart offers various configurable options, including:
- General Settings – Configure chart title settings, 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 are happy with how your graph or chart looks, click on the ‘Create Chart’ button …
The new graph or chart will now be added to your Visualizer ‘Library’ …
Note that each visual element is given a unique ID displayed as a shortcode. As you will see in a moment, this lets you add charts and graphs to your WordPress pages easily …
Charts and graphs added to the Visualizer Library can be accessed by their type …
After a chart or graph has been added to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit its details, duplicate it, or trash it …
Plugin Usage
After you’ve created a new chart or graph and added it to the Visualizer Library, adding it to a page is really simple.
First, create a new post or page (or open an existing one) …
Next, place your mouse cursor where you want to insert your visual element into your content and click on the ‘Add Media‘ button …
Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …
Find the element you want to insert into your content and click on the “insert” icon …
This inserts a shortcode into your content …
After you have added your element, click on Publish to publish (or update) your post or page …
Once the page has been updated, click ‘View post’ to see it …
The visual element will appear in the location you specified …
As mentioned earlier, the plugin also displays responsive graphs and charts for mobile browsing …
As you can see, Visualizer allows you to add and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can edit your data and your changes will automatically be reflected throughout your site. This is one of the great benefits of using the Visualizer plugin if you’re adding dynamic chart information in WordPress.
The developers of this plugin have created a number of tutorials you can refer to to learn how to edit, customize and use Visualizer.
For additional tutorials on editing, cloning, deleting and adding data to your charts, refer to the website below:
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily create attractive and mobile-responsive bar charts and graphs in WordPress with WP Visualizer.
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