Replace Radar Charts with Tables to Make Comparison Easy

In Petal Charts – an Alternative to Radar Charts I have suggested using a radar chart tweak to replace the radar charts. Both PTSBlog and Information Ocean have posted their critical reviews of these petal charts.

So as a penance for proposing petals, I am going to provide a tutorial on creating a comparison table in Excel for replacing the radar charts. We are going to create a comparison table chart like the one featured on right that is proposed at Information Ocean.

Creating Spot Matrix Charts in Excel in Just 5 Steps

The trick for creating comparison table like the above lies in using a dingbat (symbol) font named “Wingdings 2” that is pre-installed in most of the Windows machines.

• First arrange your data in tabular structure. For eg. let us assume this is the data we are trying compare:
  
• Now create another identical table. We are going to fill this one with one of the 5 circular symbols : .
• Next go to an empty cell, lets say C3, and press ALT+I followed by S (Menu > Insert > Symbol). Set the font to “Wingdings 2” and insert these 5 circular symbols to the cell C3.
• Now, in the blank table you have created in step 2, let us write formulas to fetch one of the circle symbols based on our data. A sample formula can be like this: =MID($C$3,FLOOR((data-1)/5,1)+1,1)
  
  Copy paste the formula in the entire table.
• Finally, change the font of the new table to “wingdings 2”. Adjust colors / size if needed. When you are done, the comparison chart table should look like:

  

Download the Spot Matrix Charts Template and Replace your Radars

That is all. How do you like this compared to petals?