Best practices for visualizations

Here are some best practices to consider when adding visualizations to your dashboards:

  • Use visualizations to provide insight in a way that cannot be easily represented by tabular data.
  • It can sometimes be useful to have a chart supported with a table, as a table can make finding absolute numbers easier.
  • Provide enough information, but not too much. Do not overload charts with data that is not pertinent to achieving the goal of the visualization.
  • Do not overload dashboards with visualizations. Spread visualizations out among a few dashboards rather than overloading one specific dashboard. This makes things easier for your users to view as well as improves performance.
  • Stacked charts are your friend, especially with area charts. If not stacked, area charts can have instances where large values dominate the chart, obscuring other values.
  • Scale visualizations properly. Know when it is best to use linear versus log.
  • Label your visualizations clearly so that the audience can understand what they are looking at and do not have to assume.
  • Use appropriate visualizations for the task at hand. Here is some guidance for this:
    • Comparisons over time: Use line and column charts.
    • Comparisons among items: Use bar and column charts.
    • Relationships: Use scatter charts.
    • Distribution: Use column or bar charts sorted or a scatter chart.
    • Static composition: Use column charts stacked at 100 percent or a pie chart.
    • Changing composition: Use column or area charts stacked, or column or area charts stacked at 100%.
    • Geographic statistics: Use marker or choropleth maps.
    • Make proper use of colors and thresholds when leveraging single value visualizations and gauge charts.
    • You can change the orientation of most visualizations; make use of your best judgment as required.
    • If leveraging a trellis layout on a panel, it is a best practice to place that panel on its own dashboard row. If aligned side-to-side with additional panels, it can result in poor formatting and orientation.
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