How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve no doubt heard the old adage “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you’re trying to present or explain complex information.

Charts and graphs are a great way to break up long text passages, and make technical or statistical data more easily digestible.

You can use tables to present information, but if you want people to try and make sense of complex information with figures, trends or relationships easily, then charts and graphs are perfect for helping them interpret the data.

Graphs and charts help present complex information so people can more easily understand it!

If you want to learn how to present information visually and dynamically on your WordPress site like charts and graphs, this tutorial will show you exactly how to create appealing and interactive charts to WordPress that:

• Your site visitors can interact with
• Lets you upload data from your computer or an online data source
• Will dynamically resize for mobile browsers

If you plan to display visual data like pie charts, comparison bars or trending graphs that contain static information (e.g. historical data), an easier option is to create the graphs or charts using an image editing application, convert these into .jpg or .png files and then simply insert your image files into your pages.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to easily insert interactive bar charts and pie charts into your WordPress pages and 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 colorful and dynamic charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic information.

Visualizer Plugin For WordPress

Visualizer URL

You can install the plugin in your WordPress dashboard (explained further down the page), or download the WordPress Visualizer plugin from the link below:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Description

WP Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that lets you create, manage and insert appealing charts and graphs into your WordPress posts and pages in just 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 addons are needed.

Visualizer also comes with a variety of charts 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

The plugin 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 site’s design. Various options are available for each chart that let you 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 blog or site visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile web browsers without requiring the installation of any additional software.

How To Install WordPress Visualizer

Inside your WP administration area, select Plugins > Add New from the navigation sidebar menu …

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

Locate the item in the search results section and click the “Install Now” button …

Click OK to continue …

Activate the plugin after successfully installing it …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …

Once your plugin has been activated, click on Library …

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

This brings up the plugin’s Visualizer Library page …

When you first install the plugin, the library contains no charts.

The next step is to add add charts and graphs to the plugin library.

Plugin Configuration

To add a graph or chart to the library, click on the Add New button …

An image gallery displaying all of the kinds of graphs available will come up on your screen.

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

The graph/chart type will open 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 contains your column headings.
• Your second row includes the series type (e.g. boolean, timeofday, etc.)

The screenshot below shows how to format your data correctly …

If you are unsure about how to format your CSV file, simply use the sample spreadsheet supplied 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 from your computer select ‘From Computer‘ …

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

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

Upload CSV File From The Web

For a tutorial that shows you 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, make sure that all of the information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a data file containing the correct data), and click ‘Next‘ …

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

The plugin gives you complete control over 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’re satisfied with the look of your graph or chart, click Create Chart …

The graph or chart will be added to the Visualizer ‘Library’ …

Note that new visual elements are given a unique ID displayed in a shortcode. As you will see in a moment, this lets you add graphs and charts to your pages and posts quickly …

Charts and graphs added to the Visualizer Library can easily be accessed by their type …

After adding a chart or graph to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit it, clone it, or delete it …

Plugin Usage

After creating a new graph or chart and adding it to Visualizer, adding it to pages and posts is very 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 the content and click on the ‘Add Media‘ button …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

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

This will add a shortcode for the element into your content …

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

After your page has been updated, click ‘View post’ to see the result …

You will see your graph in the location you specified …

As mentioned earlier, the plugin also displays responsive visual elements for mobile screens …

As you can see, 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 is very convenient if you’re adding interactive chart data in WordPress.

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

For tutorials on editing, copying, deleting and adding data to your charts, visit the website below:

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to easily create colorful and mobile-responsive charts and graphs in WordPress with WordPress Visualizer plugin.

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