How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress
You’ve heard the old saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This is certainly true when you are trying to present and explain complex information.
Using graphs and charts is great for breaking up technical and difficult content, and making technical or statistical data more easily digestible.
You can present data using tables, but if you want your audience to try and make sense of complex data with figures, percentages and relationships more easily, then graphs and charts are perfect for helping them visualize your information.
Charts and graphs help explain complex information so your audience can more easily understand it!
Need to add charts or graphs to your WordPress content? This tutorial shows you how to use the WP Visualizer plugin – a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that allows you to create, manage and embed mobile-responsive graphs and charts into your WordPress posts and pages that:
- Your web visitors can engage with
- Allows you to upload chart or graph data from your computer or an online source of data
- Dynamically resizes for mobile browsing
If you plan to display visual data like bar charts, comparison charts or trending graphs that contain static information (e.g. historical data), an easier way to add your data is to create the graphs or charts using a desktop application, convert these into images and then simply insert your images into your site content.
Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins
If you want to add interactive bar charts and graphs to your WordPress posts and pages with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.
Fortunately, there is a WordPress plugin that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create colorful and dynamic graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic content.
Visualizer
Visualizer Plugin URL
You can install the plugin inside your WP dashboard (see a little further down the page), or download WordPress Visualizer here:
http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer
Plugin Description
WP Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful plugin that allows you to create, manage and embed dynamic graphs and 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 needed.
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 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. A number of 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 blog or site visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile device browsers without having to install any extra plugins.
How To Install WP Visualizer
From your WP dashboard, select Plugins > Add New from the navigation sidebar menu …
In the Add Plugins screen type in “visualizer” into the search field and hit enter …
Locate the entry in the search results screen and click Install Now …
Click OK to continue …
Activate the plugin …
You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins area …
After your plugin has been activated, click on Library …
You can also get to the plugin’s ‘library’ screen by selecting Media > Visualizer Library in the admin menu …
This takes you to the plugin’s Visualizer Library screen …
When you first install the plugin, the library section will be empty.
Your next step is to add the charts and graphs to your library that you will want to insert into your content.
Visualizer Plugin Configuration
To add a new graph or chart to the library, click on Add New …
You will see all of the built-in kinds of graphs and charts available.
Select the type of chart or graph 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 all the data you want your chart or graph to be populated with …
When creating your CSV data file, ensure that:
- The first row contains your column headings.
- The second row includes the series type (e.g. boolean, datetime, etc.)
The screenshot below shows how to format your data …
If you are not sure how to format your data CSV, just download the sample that comes with the plugin.
Next, 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 and data from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …
Locate and select your data file and then click on ‘Open‘ …
The plugin imports the data and displays 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, see the article below:
After importing your 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 then click ‘Next‘ …
Depending on the chart or graph type selected, the plugin will display a number of customization options …
The plugin gives you full control over your information, and updates your display in real time …
For example, the pie chart offers many configurable options, including:
- 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 are happy with the way your chart or graph is looking, click Create Chart …
The new graph or chart will now be added to your Visualizer ‘Library’ …
Note that every visual element is given a unique ID displayed as a shortcode. As you will see very soon, this lets you add charts and graphs to your content easily …
Charts and graphs added to the Visualizer Library can be accessed by their type …
After adding a new item to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit it, clone it, or delete it …
Visualizer Usage
After you’ve created a element and added it to the Visualizer Library, adding it to a post 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 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 will place a shortcode for the element into your content …
After you have finished adding your visual element, click on Publish to publish (or update) your post or page …
Once your page has been published, click ‘View post’ to see the results …
Your page or post displays your graph in your content …
As mentioned previously, the plugin also displays responsive graphs for mobile users …
As you can see, the Visualizer plugin allows you to 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 is one of the great benefits of using the Visualizer plugin if you’re adding dynamic graph data in WordPress.
The developers of this plugin have created a series of step-by-step tutorials you can refer to for ways to edit, customize and use WordPress Visualizer.
For additional tutorials on editing, copying, deleting and adding data to your charts, go to the website below:
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily add appealing and dynamic bar charts and graphs to WordPress with WordPress Visualizer.
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