How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve heard the old adage “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you are presenting and explaining data.

Graphs and charts help to make statistical data simpler and easier to understand.

You can present information with tables, but if you want people to try and make sense of complex information with figures, trends and comparisons easily, then graphs and charts allow you to present data in an intelligent and meaningful way that can be easily processed.

Charts and graphs help explain complex data so people can more easily understand it!

Need to add charts and graphs to WordPress? This tutorial shows you how to use WP Visualizer – a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that lets you create, manage and embed appealing and dynamic graphs into your WordPress posts and pages that:

• Your web visitors can interact with
• Allows you to add data from your hard drive or a web-based data source
• Resizes dynamically for mobile devices

If you are displaying visual data like pie charts, comparison bars or trending graphs that contain static information (e.g. historical data), an easier way to add your information is to create your graphs or charts using an image editing application, convert these into jpg or png images and then simply insert your images into your site content.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

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

Fortunately, there is a free WordPress plugin that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create beautiful and dynamic charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic data.

WP Plugin: Visualizer

Visualizer URL

You can install the plugin in your WP dashboard (we show you how to do this a little further below), or download the Visualizer plugin the WP free plugin repository using the link below:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Plugin Description

WordPress Visualizer is an easy-to-use and powerful WP plugin that lets you create, manage and insert eye-catching 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 plugins or add-ons are required.

WordPress Visualizer also contains 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

Visualizer is a flexible and customizable plugin, 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 site visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile device browsers without having to install any extra plugins.

How To Install WP Visualizer

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

In the Add Plugins page type in search for “visualizer” and click enter …

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

Click OK to proceed …

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 in the 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 the charts and graphs to your library that you will want to publish to your pages or posts.

Visualizer Plugin Configuration

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

A page will load on your browser displaying all the different types of graphs available.

Select the type of chart or graph 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, make sure that:

• Your first row contains your column headings.
• The second row contains the series type (e.g. string, timeofday, etc.)

The screenshot below shows how to format your data as per the requirements above …

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

Once you have completed this step, select your 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 hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

Use the browser to locate and select your data file and then click on ‘Open‘ …

The plugin will 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:

• How To Populate Data Using Google Spreadsheet

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

Depending on the chart or graph type you have selected, the plugin will display various customization settings …

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

For example, the pie chart offers various 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 a 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 satisfied with the look of your chart or graph, click on the ‘Create Chart’ button …

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

Note that each new element is given a unique ID displayed as a shortcode. As you will see shortly, this lets you insert graphs and charts into your posts and pages easily and quickly …

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

After adding a new element to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit its details, duplicate it, or trash it …

Visualizer Plugin Usage

After creating a new graph or chart and adding it to Visualizer, it’s simple to insert it into a post.

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‘ …

Select the element you want to add to your content and click the “insert” icon …

This will place a shortcode into your content …

After you have finished adding the element, click on Publish to publish (or update) your content …

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

Your page or post displays the chart in your content …

As mentioned previously, Visualizer also displays responsive elements for mobile device browsing …

As you can see, the Visualizer plugin 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 website. This is a real time-saver if you’re working with dynamic chart information in WordPress.

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

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

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to easily insert stunning and mobile-responsive charts and graphs into your WordPress posts and pages with WP Visualizer.

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