How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve no doubt heard the saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you are presenting and explaining complex information.

Graphs and charts help to make statistical data and information much simpler to understand.

You can present information with tables, but if you want your audience to try and interpret complex data with numbers, percentages and comparisons quickly, then graphs and charts are perfect for helping them visualize your data.

Charts and graphs help explain complex data so your audience can more easily interpret it!

If you want to learn how to display dynamic visual content on your WordPress site like charts and graphs, this step-by-step tutorial will show you exactly how to create eye-catching and interactive charts and graphs to your WP posts that:

• Your web visitors can engage with
• Allows you to upload graph or chart data from your computer or an online source of data
• Will resize dynamically for mobile viewing

If you plan to display visual data like bar charts, comparison bars or trending graphs containing static information (e.g. historical data), an easier way to display the data is to create the charts or graphs using an image editing application, convert these into jpg or png images and then simply insert the image files into your page or post.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to easily create dynamic 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 free plugin for WordPress that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create attractive and mobile-responsive graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic data.

Visualizer – WordPress Plugin

Plugin URL

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

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Description

WP Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that allows you to create, manage and insert great-looking and dynamic charts into your WordPress posts and pages in just a few simple steps.

The plugin 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 plugins are required.

WordPress Visualizer also provides a variety of charts that are optimized to address 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 your web design. Various options are available for each chart that let you 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 site visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile web browsers without requiring the installation of any additional software.

Plugin Installation

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

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

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

Click OK to go ahead …

Activate the plugin after successfully installing it …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins page …

After the 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 settings …

After installing the plugin, the library contains no charts.

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

How To Configure The Visualizer Plugin

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

An image gallery displaying all of the kinds of charts and graphs 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 …

Your selected graph/chart type will open up in a new window.

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

When creating your CSV data file, make sure that:

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

The screenshot below shows how to format your data …

If you are unsure about how to format your CSV file, simply download the sample CSV file 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 the CSV file from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

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

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

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

Visualizer gives you full control of your information, 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 happy with the look of your graph or chart, click Create Chart …

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

Note that new visual elements are given a unique ID displayed as a shortcode. As you will see very soon, this allows you to easily embed graphs and charts into your content …

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

After a new graph or chart has been added to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit it, clone it, or delete it …

Visualizer Usage

After creating a new chart or graph and adding it to the Visualizer Library, 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 the ‘Add Media‘ button …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

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

This inserts 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 publishing your post/page, click ‘View post’ to see the result …

You will see the chart in your content …

As mentioned earlier, Visualizer also displays responsive charts for mobile viewing …

As you can see, the Visualizer plugin lets you insert and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can update your data and the changes will automatically be reflected throughout your site. This makes adding dynamic graph data in WordPress very efficient.

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

For 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 create eye-catching and interactive bar charts and graphs in WordPress.

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