How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

No doubt you’re familiar with the adage “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you are trying to present or explain complex information.

Using graphs and charts is a great way to make statistical data and information more easily digestible.

You can use tables to present data, but if you want your audience to try and interpret complex information with numbers, percentages and comparisons quickly, then charts and graphs allow you to present your data in an intelligent and meaningful manner that can be easily understood.

Graphs and charts help present complex data so your audience can more easily interpret it!

Need to add charts or graphs to your WordPress pages and posts? This step-by-step tutorial shows you how to use WordPress Visualizer – an easy-to-use and powerful WP plugin that allows you to create, manage and insert eye-catching and interactive charts and graphs into your WordPress posts and pages in a few mouse clicks that:

• Your site visitors can interact with
• Allows you to add chart or graph data from your hard drive or a web-based data source
• Dynamically resizes for mobile users

If you plan to display visual data like pie charts, comparison charts or trending graphs containing static information (e.g. historical data), a simple method you can use to display this information is to create the charts or graphs using a desktop application, convert these into images and then simply insert your image files into your posts.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to create interactive bar charts 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 great plugin for WordPress that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create appealing and dynamic graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with updateable information.

WordPress Plugin: Visualizer

Visualizer URL

You can install the plugin in your WordPress dashboard (explained further below), or access and download the Visualizer plugin the WordPress free plugin repository using the link below:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Plugin Description

The Visualizer plugin is a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that allows you to create, manage and embed beautiful graphs and charts 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 extra add-ons are required.

Visualizer also provides 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

Visualizer is flexible and customizable, allowing you to use Google Chart Tools with their default setting, or configure an extensive set of options to match the look and feel of your website. 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 blog or site visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile web browsers without having to install any additional software.

How To Install Visualizer

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

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

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

Click OK to continue …

Activate the plugin after installing it …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …

Once the plugin has been activated, click on Library …

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

This brings up the plugin’s Visualizer Library screen …

After installing the plugin, the library section will be empty.

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

How To Configure Visualizer

To add a chart or graph to the plugin’s library, click on Add New …

A visual gallery displaying all the types of charts and graphs available will load on your screen.

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

The selected graph/chart type will pop up in a new window.

The next step is to upload a CSV file that contains 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 as explained above …

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

Once you have done this, select the data source (‘From Computer’ or ‘From Web’) in the ‘Upload CSV File’ section.

Upload CSV File From Computer

To upload your CSV file from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

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

The plugin will import your data 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, make sure that all of the information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a 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 options …

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

For example, the pie chart offers many configurable options, such as:

• 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 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’re satisfied with the look of your chart or graph, click Create Chart …

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

Note that each visual element is given a unique ID displayed in a shortcode. As you will see shortly, this allows you to insert graphs and charts into your posts easily …

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

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

Visualizer Plugin Usage

Once you have created a element and added it to Visualizer, it’s very easy to add it to a post or page.

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 Add Media …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

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

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

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

After updating your post, click ‘View post’ to see the end result …

You will see the graph or chart in the content …

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

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 site. This is a real time-saver if you’re working with interactive chart data in WordPress.

The developers of this plugin have created a number of step-by-step tutorials you can refer to for ways to edit, customize and use Visualizer.

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

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to easily insert dynamic charts and graphs into WordPress.

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