How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

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

Using graphs and charts is great for making data more easily digestible.

You can use tables to present data, but if you want your audience to try and make sense of complex information with numbers, trends and comparisons quickly, then charts and graphs let you present data in an intelligent and meaningful way that can be quickly processed.

Graphs and charts help explain 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 plugin for WordPress that lets you create, manage and embed colorful and interactive graphs and charts into your WordPress posts and pages that:

• Your web visitors can engage with
• Allows you to upload data from your computer or an online data source
• Dynamically resizes for mobile viewers

If you are displaying visual data like bar charts, comparison bars or trending graphs containing static information (e.g. historical data), a simple method you can use is to create the charts or graphs using an image editing application, convert these into .jpg or .png files and then simply add your files and an image to your post or page.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to create dynamic bar charts and 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 colorful and interactive charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic information.

Visualizer Plugin For WordPress

Plugin URL

You can install the plugin in your WordPress dashboard (explained a little further below), or access and download the WP Visualizer plugin from the link below:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Plugin Description

WordPress Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that lets you create, manage and embed beautiful graphs into your WordPress posts and pages with just a few mouse clicks.

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 extra addons are required.

The plugin 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

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 site’s design. Several 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 additional plugins.

Plugin Installation

From your WP dashboard, select Plugins > Add New from the main admin menu …

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

Locate the entry in the search results section and click Install Now …

Click OK to proceed …

Activate the plugin after installation is successful …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …

After your plugin has been activated, click on Library …

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

This brings up the plugin’s Visualizer Library screen …

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

Your next step is to add add charts and graphs to your plugin library.

Visualizer Configuration

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

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

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

Your selected graph/chart type will pop up in a lightbox.

The next step is to upload a CSV file containing your data …

When creating your CSV data file, make sure that:

• Your first row includes the column headings.
• The second row includes the series type (e.g. boolean, date, etc.)

The screenshot below shows how to format your data correctly …

If you are not sure how to format your CSV file, just download the sample spreadsheet that comes with the plugin.

Once you have created your CSV file, 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 and data 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 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, go here:

• How To Populate Data Using Google Spreadsheet

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

Depending on the chart or graph type you’ve selected, the plugin will display a range of customization options and settings …

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

For example, the pie chart offers many configurable options, including:

• 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 happy with the look of your chart or graph, click Create Chart …

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

Note that every new element is given a unique ID displayed in a shortcode. As you will see shortly, this lets you insert charts and graphs into your content very easily …

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

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

Visualizer Usage

After creating a element and adding it to Visualizer, adding it to a 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 your content and click on Add Media …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

Find the element you want to insert into your content and click the “insert” icon …

This inserts a shortcode into your content …

After you have added the element, click on Publish to publish (or update) your page or post …

After publishing your page/post, click ‘View post’ to see the end result …

You will see the visual element in where you’ve added the shortcode …

As mentioned earlier, the plugin also displays responsive charts for mobile browsing …

As you can see, Visualizer allows you to add 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 dynamic graph information in WordPress.

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

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

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to add eye-catching and interactive bar charts and graphs to your WordPress pages and posts with WordPress Visualizer plugin.

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