Where a pie chart shows one total split into slices, a bar chart compares values side by side, one bar per category, and a line chart plots one or more series across shared categories, so it suits trends over time. Both are ordinary canvas elements: they drop in with sample data and take their colours from the active theme.
Adding one
In Illustrate, open the Data category on the palette strip. In Diagram mode, use the search panel instead: type "bar chart" or "line chart".
Pick Column or Line, then tap the canvas to drop it, or drag to draw it at a size. It lands with sample data so it looks finished straight away.
Chart types
Any chart can draw its data seven ways, named as Google Sheets and Excel name them. Right-click it, open Tools, then Chart Type, and pick one:
- Column: upright bars, one per category. The palette's Column tile makes one.
- Bar: the same bars lying down, growing to the right, which leaves room for long category names.
- Line: a line with a point per category, for each series.
- Area: the lines, with the space under each one filled in its colour, so a total's shape reads at a glance.
- Scatter: a point per category, no lines. When every category is a number, each point sits at its number along the bottom, so it shows how two measures relate.
- Pie and Doughnut: slices of a whole; a doughnut leaves the middle open.
Switching keeps the chart's size, colours, legend and animation. Moving between a column, bar or pie chart and a line, area or scatter chart moves the data too: the bars become one series named Series 1, or the first series becomes the bars.
Editing a column or bar chart
A column or bar chart holds one value per bar, the same way a pie chart holds one per slice. Right-click it, open Tools, then Data: each row is a bar, with a swatch for its colour, a label and a value. Edit them in place, remove a bar with ×, or add one with + Add Slice. The chart updates as soon as you leave a field.
Editing a line, area or scatter chart
A line chart's data is a grid (an area or scatter chart's too), too wide for the menu, so its Tools then Data section lists the series and offers Edit Data. That opens the Chart data dialog:
- Edit the grid directly: a row per category, a column per series. Add a series with the + at the end of the header row, add a category with + Add row, and remove either with its × (a chart always keeps at least one of each).
- Import CSV loads a file: the header row's first cell labels the category column and the rest name the series, and each row below is a category and its values (up to 12 series and 200 rows), so you can save a sheet from a spreadsheet and load it straight in. Importing replaces what the grid held.
Changes apply as you make them (a typed cell when you leave it); Done closes the dialog.
Display and colours
Both charts share the pie chart's display options: in Tools, Chart places the legend (Off, Top, Left, Right or Below, the default) and sets its Text Size, and the Animation section offers Grow, Pop, Spin and Pulse. Hovering a bar or a point shows its label and value. Show Values, under the legend, prints each bar's or point's number on the chart; a column chart also names each column under it, so you can turn the legend off.
Colours default to variants of the theme, so a multi-series chart stays legible and on-brand. To recolour the whole chart at once, open Style and pick a palette from its Presets: Vivid, Ocean, Forest, Sunset, Berry, Earth, Grey or Contrast. A colour you set on one bar by hand wins over the palette. Animations freeze on export, so a still image looks right.
For a single percentage rather than a series, a progress bar or ring reads more clearly than a one-bar chart.
Was this article helpful?