How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’re probably familiar with the saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you’re trying to present or explain complex data.

Using charts and graphs is great for breaking up content that has too much text, and making technical or statistical data more easily digestible.

You can present data with tables, but if you want people to try and make sense of complex data with figures, percentages and comparisons easily, then charts and graphs are perfect for helping them interpret your data.

Charts and graphs help you present complex data so people can more easily interpret it!

If you need to present dynamic visual content on your WordPress site like charts and graphs, this step-by-step tutorial will show you how to create beautiful and updatable charts and graphs to your pages that:

• Your web visitors can engage with
• Lets you upload data from your hard drive or a web-based data source
• Will dynamically resize for mobile devices

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

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to easily insert dynamic bar charts and pie graphs into 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 great-looking and dynamic graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with updateable data.

Visualizer – WP Plugin

Plugin URL

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

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Plugin Description

Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful plugin that allows you to create, manage and embed eye-catching charts and graphs 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 add-ons are needed.

The plugin also provides 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

WordPress 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 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 extra plugins.

Plugin Installation

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

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

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

Click OK to proceed …

Activate the plugin after successfully installing it …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …

After your plugin has been activated, click on Library …

You can 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 options page …

After installing the plugin, the library contains no charts.

Your next step is to add the charts and graphs to your library that you plan to insert into your content.

Visualizer Plugin Configuration

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

A page will appear on your screen displaying all the different types of graphs available.

Select the type of graph or chart 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:

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

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

If you are unsure about how to format your CSV file, just download 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 a CSV file from your computer select ‘From Computer‘ …

Locate and select your data file and 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 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 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’ve chosen, the plugin displays a number of customization options …

The WordPress Visualizer plugin gives you total 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 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 satisfied with the way your chart or graph appears, click on the ‘Create Chart’ button …

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

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

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

After adding a new element to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit its details, clone it, or delete it …

Visualizer Usage

After creating a new graph or chart and adding it to Visualizer, adding it to posts or pages is 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 to be inserted into your content and click the “insert” icon …

This will place a shortcode into your content …

Once you have finished adding your item, click on Publish to publish (or update) your post or page …

After publishing the page/post, click ‘View post’ to see it …

Your graph or chart will show in your content …

As mentioned earlier, Visualizer also displays responsive graphs and charts 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 the changes will automatically be reflected wherever you have inserted your charts, graphs, comparison bars , etc. in your website. This makes adding interactive graph data in WordPress really easy.

The developers of this plugin have created a series of 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 insert great-looking and dynamic charts and graphs into WordPress.

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