19 February 2019
Let's get VIZZICAL! Watch now
A Bar chart is a graph displaying data using a number of bars with equal width. It’s also known as a Column chart. Each bar displays a particular category. And the length of the bar represents the category size.
A Bar chart is a common graph type because it’s simple to create and easy to interpret. It’s a popular visualisation tool for analysing categories of data, like cities or product types. You can use it to compare the values between different categories in one view. The design of the graph highlights the performance level of each category, ensuring the highest and lowest performing categories are easily recognisable.
Bar charts can be displayed vertically or horizontally. And sometimes the bars are stacked on top of each other, like with a stacked Bar chart. This variant is useful for viewing the contribution of the different sub-groups to a total amount and comparing their performance.
But the show’s not over yet for this practical chart! You can also combine it with other extensions to create more substantial visualisations and dashboards, like you may have noticed with the Vizlib Combo chart.
In the Healthcare industry, Bar charts display metrics like the heart rate of a patient per day, analyse the highest adult diabetes prevalence around different states or compare the average waiting time of the patients in different health centres.
Within the Finance world, they’re useful for comparing budget vs. actual expenses for the quarter, revenue for each month, the profits of different divisions over time or actual performance against an average benchmark.
Leaders heading up Retail companies find Bar charts useful for measuring target vs. actual sales for multiple quarters, comparing product sales across categories for multiple divisions or showing sales performance for different geographies.
Manufacturing companies utilise them to analyse productivity levels over different periods.
Bar charts help technology companies compare traffic trends, the number of active users or the performance of different business units.
Energy and Utility companies analyse how much was spent on gas and electricity for different periods of the year with the help of Bar charts.
In the Communication sector, companies use the Bar chart to establish their main traffic sources for the year.
Public sector organisations review the data from various entities with Bar charts, as well as demonstrate the developmental and financial impacts for different units.
The Life Sciences industry may measure metrics like deaths vs. births over a decade period or compare a population by income with a Bar chart.
And, in the Consumer Products industry, Bar charts help executives to compare income vs. expenditure for different stores in a city or identify which products performed best in which region.
Vizlib Bar Chart is a user-friendly and highly customisable extension for Qlik Sense. Your data visualisation skills will benefit from features such as:
Here are a few tips for creating a highly-customised visualisation with the Vizlib Bar Chart:
Viztips: The power of visual analytics on hover
Viztips is a next-level capability for Vizlib Library that enables you to insert customised, dynamic charts in your tooltips. Include Viztips with Vizlib Bar Chart to add additional insights without adding clutter to your chart. Your end-users can get granular level data on hover, without being overwhelmed by too much data. Since Viztips consist of two components; your main Vizlib chart and a Vizlib KPI Designer Layer, you can include up to 10 layers in your Viztip design!
Bar charts are a simple and effective way to display and analyse data. They’re uncluttered and help your audience get the right insights fast!
Find out more on the Vizlib Bar Chart Designer here.
Here are a few examples of customised Bar charts created with the Vizlib Bar Chart:
2020 © Vizlib Ltd. – All rights reserved.
Vizlib’s feature-rich data visualisation products will help you get started on your data storytelling journey.
Got a technical question? Our Help Centre has heaps of helpful guides, articles, FAQs and more. Access Help Centre