How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

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

Using charts and graphs is a great way to make statistical data and information simpler to understand.

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

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

Need to add charts and graphs to your WordPress posts and pages? This tutorial shows you how to use WordPress Visualizer – a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that allows you to create, manage and embed stunning charts into your WordPress posts and pages that:

• Your site visitors can engage with
• Lets you add data from your computer or a web-based data source
• Is dynamically responsive for mobile viewers

If you are displaying visual data like bar charts, comparison graphs or trending graphs which contain information that is not going to change (e.g. historical data), a simple method you can use to display your data is to create your graphs or charts using a desktop application, convert these into .jpg and .png files and then simply add the images to your site content.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to insert interactive bars and pie charts into your WordPress pages with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.

Fortunately, there is a plugin for WordPress sites that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create colorful and dynamic charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic information.

WP Plugin: Visualizer

Visualizer URL

You can install the plugin inside your WP dashboard (we will show you how to do this further below), or download the WP Visualizer plugin the WordPress plugin directory using 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 embed eye-catching and dynamic charts and graphs 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 plugins are required.

Visualizer also contains a variety of built-in 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 site’s design. Various options are available for each chart that allow you to 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 extra plugins.

Plugin Installation

Inside your WP dashboard, select Plugins > Add New from the dashboard menu …

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

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

Click OK to continue …

Activate the plugin after successfully installing it …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins area …

Once the plugin has been activated, click on Library …

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

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

After installing the plugin, the library contains no charts.

The next step is to add the charts and graphs to your library that you will want to publish to your pages or posts.

How To Configure Visualizer

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

A page will appear in your screen displaying all of the built-in kinds of charts and graphs available.

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

Your selected graph/chart type will pop 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:

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

The screenshot below shows how to format your data as required …

If you are not sure how to format your CSV file, just use the sample spreadsheet 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 your CSV file from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

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

The plugin imports the data and displays it using the graph/chart type you have chosen …

Upload CSV File From The Web

For a step-by-step tutorial that explains 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 the data, make sure that all of your information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a data file with the right data), and then click ‘Next‘ …

Depending on the chart or graph type you’ve picked, the plugin displays various customization options …

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

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

• 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 how your chart or graph is looking, click on the ‘Create Chart’ button …

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

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

Charts and graphs 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, duplicate it, or trash it …

Visualizer Plugin Usage

Once you have created a new chart or graph and added it to the Visualizer Library, it’s quite simple to add it to your pages and posts.

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‘ …

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

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

Once you have added your item, click on Publish to publish (or update) your content …

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

Your post or page displays the chart in the location where you placed the shortcode …

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

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

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

For tutorials on editing, cloning, deleting and adding data to your charts, go to the website below:

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to add eye-catching and mobile-responsive pie charts and graphs to your WordPress content with WordPress Visualizer.

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