How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve heard the old saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This is certainly true when you’re trying to present or explain complex information.

Using charts and graphs is great for breaking up long text passages, and making statistical data much easier to understand.

You can use tables to present data, but if you want people to try and interpret complex data with figures, percentages or comparisons more easily, then graphs and charts are perfect for helping them understand the information.

Graphs and charts help explain complex information so people can more easily interpret it!

If you need to learn how to display information visually and dynamically on your WordPress site using charts and graphs, this tutorial will show you how to create and add great-looking and updatable charts and graphs to your posts that:

• Your site visitors can engage with
• Allows you to upload chart or graph data from your hard drive or a web-based source of data
• Is responsive for viewing on mobile devices

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

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to embed dynamic bar charts and pie charts into WordPress with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.

Fortunately, there is a great free WordPress plugin 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 updateable data.

WP Plugin: Visualizer

Visualizer URL

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

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Plugin Description

Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful plugin that allows you to create, manage and insert 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 additional plugins 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

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. Various options are available for each chart that allow you to further 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 additional software.

How To Install The Visualizer Plugin

Inside your WordPress admin area, select Plugins > Add New from the main sidebar menu …

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

Locate the plugin in the search results area and click Install Now …

Click OK to go ahead …

Activate the plugin …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins page …

After your plugin has been activated, click on Library …

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

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

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

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

How To Configure Visualizer

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

A visual gallery displaying all of the types of charts available will come up on your screen.

Select the type of graph or chart 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:

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

The screenshot below shows how to format your data correctly …

If you are unsure about how to format your data CSV, just use the sample spreadsheet that comes with the plugin.

Once you have completed this step, 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 and data from your computer select ‘From Computer‘ …

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

The plugin will import your data and display it using the graph/chart type chosen …

Upload CSV File From The Web

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

Depending on the chart or graph type you have chosen, the plugin displays various customization settings …

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

For example, the pie chart offers many 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 the look of your graph or chart, click Create Chart …

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

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

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

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

Plugin Usage

After creating a new element and adding it to the Visualizer Library, adding it to a page or post is really 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 Add Media …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

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

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

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

After updating your post/page, click ‘View post’ to see it …

Your page or post should display the graph or chart in where you have added the shortcode …

As mentioned previously, Visualizer also displays responsive charts and graphs for mobile viewers …

As you can see, Visualizer lets you insert and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can edit your data and the changes will automatically be reflected throughout your website. This is great if you’re managing dynamic chart information in WordPress.

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

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 appealing and dynamic pie charts and graphs into WordPress with WP Visualizer.

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