Managing Chart Axes

Many aspects of the axes for X/Y charts (Bar, Line, and so on) can be controlled from settings that can be found under X-Axis and Y-Axis sections in the Styles section of the Configuration Panel. These include adding a custom label to the axes, deciding if you want to show values or not, and if so, choosing the orientation of the values you want to display (horizontal, vertical, diagonal), among others. These settings are explained in this article.

The settings for the two axes are different for the axis that is used to plot Categories (usually X, or the horizontal axis), and the one that is used to plot Values (usually Y, or the vertical axis). However, the role of these two is switched if the chart orientation is reversed. Therefore the access points that are shown in the images in this article can also change places.

Axis Labels

Axis Labels are by default displayed halfway along the length of each axis and next to it. The default values of the labels are set to the name of the column that is plotted on that axis. To change the display of labels, enable or disable the Axis Labels checkbox, which can be found directly inside the Styles section. This setting controls both axis labels simultaneously.

To display something other than the column name, you can customize the label from the Label setting in the corresponding axis section.

For Como Charts, where more than one Y-axis can exist, each used column is presented in a section of its own, and the axis label, as well as other characteristics of the axis, can be controlled from under that section.

The options for managing the chart axes depend on the type of chart you have chosen. For more information, see Chart Types.

Controlling he Display of Values

Data Values are displayed by default along both axes. All data values for category columns are listed next to a tick mark along the category axis (most commonly, the x-axis). Values shown along the value axis (most commonly the y-axis) are however numbers that reflect the range of the value axis, from the minimum to the maximum, and are displayed at appropriate intervals to prevent overcrowding.
Values for each axis can be hidden by unchecking the box next to the Values setting for that axis. If needed, they can also be rotated to horizontal, slanted, and vertical orientations, in order to prevent them from overlapping. Numeric values can be further customized by choosing one of the following options for their format:

• –: Automatic formatting of the number.

• 1K: Abbreviation of the number by its thousands, using K for one thousand, M for one million, B for one billion, and so on.

• .00: More or less precision by showing a set number of decimal points.

• $: Currency format, putting a $ in front of the number.

• %: Adds a percentage sign next to the number.

• X^y: Changes the number format to scientific format.

  

Controlling Scale

The default scale type for an X/Y chart is Linear, meaning that data is seen as if it were on a line divided into equal parts. However, a linear scale is not appropriate for data that is spread over a wide range. Use the Logarithmic Scale in Chart Builder to display numerical data over a wide range of values in a compact way. Find the setting to change the scale type to Logarithmic in the Scale Type dropdown under Y-Axis (or X-Axis, if the chart orientation has been changed) in the Configuration Panel. Choosing the logarithmic scale type will remove the ability to manage the interval between the tick marks through the Step setting (explained below).

Setting The Range

By default, the automatic range for the value axis starts at 0 and goes up to the maximum value that is plotted on the chart. Chart creators can override the automatic range of their charts to fit their analysis needs so that a chart doesn’t result in too much whitespace giving it a cleaner look. To change the range, go to the Styles section of the configuration panel in the Chart Builder and expand the Y-axis subsection (or X-axis, if that happens to be the value axis). Set the values for Min Range and Max Range to what works for the chart.

Note: If the chart orientation is inverted to show the values on the X-axis, the Min Range/Max Range options will be located in the X-axis configuration settings.

Axis Intervals

You can control the tick marks' intervals to display on the value axis by changing the Steps option located inside the value axis style panel. By default, the option will be set to Auto, meaning the chart will calculate the appropriate intervals based on the axis scale range and the dataset values.

Depending on how wide the axis range is, the default configuration could display many tick marks, making it hard to read or analyze the chart. By defining the Steps option, you can control how many units the tick marks will be apart. In the example below, we set the step to 100 units, so the chart will display a tick mark every 100 units starting from 0, resulting in only 3 tick marks.

When the axis range is wide (for example, 0 - 10,000,000), setting the Steps option to 1 will create 10 million tick marks, causing performance issues. To avoid this situation, the chart ignores the defined value and reverts to automatic mode.