Chart types

Every chart type in Halo, what each one takes and what each one is for, with live examples you can hover and read as a table.

A chart is a saved question over one dataset. Pick a type in the chart editor, and the editor shows the fields that type needs. Switching type moves your fields across where they still fit.

Pick a type here to see the same data drawn each way.

Edit a chart together

Several people can have one chart's editor open at once. You see each other's changes as they're made. Undo reverses only your own, whoever saves saves everyone's edits, and the toolbar says Not connected if you lose your connection. It works the way editing a report together does.

All the types

Text blocks are a report element, not a chart. See Text and images.

Rules every chart follows

• Color follows the series. Series take Halo's palette of eight colors in order, or your organization's brand palette. Saving a chart pins each series to its color, so filters never repaint the ones left.

• Past eight series, the rest fold into a gray Other. On scatter and bubble charts, a Color by with more than three values shows the two largest and folds the rest.

• Every chart has a table view, which is also the accessible way to read its values. A scorecard placed in a report is the exception, since it's a single number already.

• Row limit sets how many rows a chart asks for: 1,000 by default, up to 100,000.

Single numbers

Scorecard

A headline number. Under Compare, it can show the change from the previous period or the same period last year, and Trend line draws a small line under the value. A comparison needs a date field and a date range filter.

Gauge

One number against a scale. Under Style, set Min, Max and Target, and add Ranges, low to high in grays, for stretches such as behind and close.

Bullet

A value and a target as a compact bar, one per row if you add a grouping, with the same Min, Max, Target and ranges as a gauge. Use it when several gauges wouldn't fit.

Trends

Line

The first choice for change over time. Group a date by a time grain on the axis. Turn on Smooth lines under Style if you like, and Zoom slider for long ranges.

Add a Breakdown for one line per value:

Area

A line with its parts stacked. Areas stack unless you turn off Stack series, since overlapping fills hide each other. Use it when the total matters as much as the parts.

Trend lines work on lines, areas, columns and combos. So do forecasts, including on an area with one series. Forecast periods isn't offered on stacked series, or on an hour or minute axis, so an area with several series needs Stack series off. See Trend lines, forecasts and reference lines.

Comparing

Column

Upright bars, for categories and for periods. Bars can carry color rules, like the busy months marked here.

Bar

Sideways bars. Long names read easily on them, so they suit rankings. Sort largest first under Sort and limit. Value labels adds the number to each bar, and a breakdown can stack with Stack series.

Combo

Measures together, each as Bars or Line. They share one value axis unless you check Second axis on a measure. Two scales on one plot invite misreading, so consider two charts first.

Parts of a whole

Pie and donut

Shares of a whole. Most slices, with Other sets the most slices a chart shows, counting Other: 6 by default, up to 8. Use them for a few slices of a real whole. A bar reads more exactly past that.

Treemap and sunburst

Shares across up to three nested groupings. A treemap nests rectangles, with the outer group first. A sunburst uses rings, with the inner group first.

Funnel

Drop-off through stages, widest first unless you sort.

Waterfall

How a number got from here to there. Each step adds or takes away, in order, and it ends with a total bar unless you turn off Total bar.

Sankey

How amounts flow between two groupings, such as channel to region.

Tables

Table

Exact values with Dimensions and Measures, up to eight of each. Totals row adds totals, and only sums and counts add up. A chart that stops at its row limit says so underneath, and leaves totals out, since they'd add up only part of the rows.

Pivot

Rows down the side and one grouping spread across the top. Totals row totals rows and columns.

Reports also have a full data table element, with sorting, filtering and paging for readers: see The report builder.

Relationships and spread

Scatter and bubble

Each point is one value of Label points by, placed by its measures: X and Y on a scatter, plus size on a bubble. Color by colors points by a dimension.

Heatmap

A number shaded across two groupings: Across and down. Good for finding patterns, such as a busy month in one region.

Calendar

A number shaded per day, in a calendar's layout. It takes one date field.

Histogram

How a number's values are spread, split into ranges. Bar height counts rows unless you pick a measure, and Range width sets each bar's range; left empty, Halo picks one from the data's spread.

Box plot

A number's spread, row by row: the minimum, the 25th percentile, the median, the 75th percentile and the maximum. Add Groups for one box each.

Places and schedules

Map

Shaded regions or points. See Maps.

Gantt

Bars from a start date to an end date, one per label. Color by gives one color per value. It reads no measures.