Free Tool
Chart Type Selector
Last reviewed on 2026-05-22.
Answer four questions, get the right chart type for your data
Why chart type matters
Picking the wrong chart type doesn't just make the chart harder to read — it can change what conclusions viewers draw. A pie chart with 12 slices, a line chart with non-temporal x-axis values, a stacked bar with too many categories — each one produces a chart that's technically correct but practically misleading.
Quick reference
- Pie chart — part-to-whole, 2–6 categories.
- Bar chart — comparing values across categories, any number.
- Line chart — trends over time.
- Area chart — cumulative trends, or stacked totals over time.
- Scatter plot — relationship between two continuous variables.
- Histogram — distribution of one variable across bins.
- Treemap — part-to-whole with many categories or hierarchy.