How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve heard the adage “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you’re presenting or explaining complex information.

Using graphs and charts is great for making statistical data much simpler to understand.

You can present data with tables, but if you want people to try and make sense of complex information with numbers, trends or relationships more easily, then graphs and charts allow you to present information in a meaningful and intelligent manner that can be quickly processed.

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

If you need to present information visually and dynamically on your WordPress site using graphs and charts, this step-by-step tutorial will show you how to create colorful and interactive graphs and charts to your pages that:

• Your web visitors can interact with
• Lets you add graph or chart data from your computer or an online data source
• Is dynamically responsive for mobile device users

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

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to easily create dynamic bar charts and pie charts in WordPress posts and pages 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 colorful and mobile-responsive charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with updatable information.

Visualizer – WP Plugin

Plugin URL

You can install the plugin in your WordPress dashboard (explained further down the page), or download Visualizer here:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Description

WordPress Visualizer is an easy-to-use and powerful WP plugin that allows you to create, manage and insert appealing and dynamic graphs and charts into your WordPress posts and pages in just a few mouse clicks.

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 needed.

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 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. Several options are available for each chart that let you customize their settings.

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 devices without having to install any additional plugins.

How To Install The Plugin

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

In the Add Plugins page 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 installation is successful …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins page …

Once your 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 takes you to the plugin’s Visualizer Library settings …

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

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

How To Configure Visualizer

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

A gallery displaying all of the default kinds of charts available will load on your screen.

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

Your 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, ensure that:

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

The screenshot below shows how to format your data as explained above …

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

Once you have created your CSV file, 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 and data from your computer select ‘From Computer‘ …

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

The plugin will now import the data from the CSV file and display it using the graph/chart type you have previously chosen …

Upload CSV File From The Web

For a step-by-step tutorial that shows you how to create, save and publish data to a Visualizer chart or graph using Google Spreadsheet, see the article below:

• How To Populate Data Using Google Spreadsheet

After importing your data, check that all of the 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 a number of customization settings and options …

Visualizer gives you total control over your information, and updates your display in real time …

For example, the pie chart offers various 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 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 how your chart or graph appears, click Create Chart …

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

Note that new visual elements are given a unique ID displayed in a shortcode. As you will see very soon, this lets you insert charts and graphs into your WordPress pages and posts quickly and easily …

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

After adding a graph or chart to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit its details, clone it, or trash it …

Visualizer Plugin Usage

Once you’ve created a new chart or graph and added it to the Visualizer Library, adding it to a page is quite 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 the content and click on Add Media …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

Select the chart or graph to be inserted into your content and click on the “insert” icon …

This will place a shortcode into your content …

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

After your post has been published, click ‘View post’ to see the result …

You will see the graph or chart in where you placed the shortcode …

As mentioned earlier, Visualizer also displays responsive charts and graphs for mobile device users …

As you can see, Visualizer allows you to add and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can change your data and your changes will automatically be reflected throughout your website. This makes working with interactive chart data in WordPress really easy.

The plugin developers have created a series of step-by-step 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 website below:

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to easily create stunning and mobile-responsive charts and graphs in WordPress with WordPress Visualizer.

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