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 data.
Using graphs and charts is useful for breaking up content with a disproportionate amount of text, and making statistical data and information a lot simpler to grasp.
You can present information with tables, but if you want your audience to try and interpret complex data with figures, trends and relationships easily, then graphs and charts let you present data in an intelligent and meaningful way that can be easily understood.
Graphs and charts help explain complex information so people can more easily interpret it!
Need to add charts and graphs to WordPress? This tutorial shows you how to use the WordPress Visualizer plugin – a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that lets you create, manage and embed interactive graphs and charts into your WordPress posts and pages with a few mouse clicks that:
- Your visitors can engage with
- Lets you add data from your computer or a web-based source of data
- Will resize dynamically for mobile screens
If you are displaying visual data like pie charts, comparison charts or trending graphs that contain static information (e.g. historical data), an easier way to add the information is to create your charts or graphs using an image editing application, convert these into images and then simply add your images to your pages.
Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins
If you want to easily create interactive bars and pie charts in WordPress pages and posts with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.
Fortunately, there is a great free WordPress plugin that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create attractive and dynamic graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic data.
WordPress Plugin: Visualizer
Plugin URL
You can install the plugin in your WP dashboard (explained a little further down the page), or download Visualizer from the link below:
http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer
Visualizer Description
The Visualizer plugin is a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that allows you to create, manage and embed eye-catching charts into your WordPress posts and pages in just a few mouse clicks.
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 components are required.
WordPress 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 your site’s design. Various options are available for each chart that let you further 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 web browsers without requiring the installation of any additional plugins.
How To Install WP Visualizer
From your WP dashboard, select Plugins > Add New from the main menu …
In the Add Plugins page type in search for “visualizer” and hit enter …
Locate the plugin in the search results section and click the “Install Now” button …
Click OK to go ahead …
Activate the plugin after installing it …
You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …
Once your plugin has been activated, click on Library …
You can get to the plugin’s ‘library’ screen by choosing Media > Visualizer Library in the dashboard menu …
This takes you to the plugin’s Visualizer Library options page …
When you first install the plugin, this section will be empty.
Your next step is to add add charts and graphs to your plugin library.
How To Configure The Visualizer Plugin
To add a new chart or graph to the library, click on ‘Add New’ …
A page will appear on your browser displaying all the different kinds of charts and graphs available.
Select the graph or chart type you would like to create and click on the ‘Next’ button …
Your graph/chart type will open up in a lightbox.
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 includes the series type (e.g. number, date, etc.)
The screenshot below shows how to format your data correctly …
If you are unsure about how to format your CSV file, simply study the sample spreadsheet provided 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 click on ‘Open‘ …
The plugin imports your data and displays it using the graph/chart type 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:
After importing the data, check 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 a number of customization settings and options …
The plugin gives you total control over 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 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 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’re happy with how your graph or chart appears, click on the ‘Create Chart’ button …
The new chart or graph will be added to your Visualizer ‘Library’ …
Note that every element is given a unique ID displayed as a shortcode. As you will see in a moment, this lets you add graphs and charts to your content easily and quickly …
Charts and graphs added to the Visualizer Library can easily be accessed by their type …
After adding an element to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit its details, clone it, or trash it …
Visualizer Plugin Usage
After creating a graph or chart and adding it to the Library, it’s easy to insert it into your content.
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 the “insert” icon …
This adds a shortcode for the element into your content …
Once you have finished adding the item, click on Publish to publish (or update) your content …
After publishing the page, click ‘View post’ to see the end result …
You will see your element in where you have added the shortcode …
As mentioned earlier, Visualizer also displays responsive charts and graphs for mobile devices …
As you can see, the Visualizer plugin lets you insert and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can edit your data and your changes will automatically be reflected wherever you have inserted your charts, graphs, comparison bars , etc. in your website. This makes working with dynamic graph data in WordPress very easy.
The developers of this plugin have created a series of step-by-step 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, refer to the site below:
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily add beautiful and mobile-responsive charts and graphs to your WordPress pages and posts.
***
"I love the way your email series "Infinite Web Content Creation Training Series" is documented and presented. It is very absorbing and captivating. The links and tutorials are interesting and educational. This has motivated me to rewrite my content following the concepts I am learning from the email series." - Mani Raju, www.fortuneinewaste.com
***