fbpx
Search
Close this search box.

Say NO to Default Charts Forever!

Share

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

or Excel Charting Hacks # 2

Roughly 35-40% of my working time in office is spent with powerpoint. As one of my mentors said, powerpoint gives neither the power nor the point. Apart from writing truck loads of bullet points and using auto shapes, I also work alot with numbers and charts. Obviously I resort to excel for drawing the same, but over the last few months I have observed that, everytime I create a chart, I follow these steps mechanically,

  • Adjust the font to Verdana or something
  • Remove the chart background
  • Format gridlines to something really dull and dotted
  • Remove the outline border for individual bars / pies etc.
  • Enable data labels, format them
  • Change colors of the bars / pies to something pleasent to the eye

It take roughly 2-3 mins for each chart to do this, often it takes more time when I am working with lots of numbers. Now, that is a lot of time to waste on daily basis. So I have developed few “user-defined charts”. Whenever I create a chart I apply one of these templates and then touch it up based on the presentation template or need of the hour. This is saving me a quite a lot of time and might as well do it for you.

User Defined Charts in Excel:

UDCs is a very useful hidden feature in excel that saves a lot of time, easy to know and use and still lacks significant awareness. I think, excel is full of such things.

How to define “User Defined Chart”:

Once you have a chart formated to your need, you can add it user-defined charts list so that you can use it next time with a different set of data. To do that;

  1. Select the chart which you want to add to “user defined” list
  2. Click on menu options Chart->chart-type
  3. Go to Custom tab, select “user-defined” radio. Click on the add button and specify a title and description. (see the screenshots aside. Focus on the Red circles)

Now, for your use I have included all the 13 chart templates I have created in an excel. Download excel charting hacks # 2 and say NO to default charts forever. Remember, you have to add my charts to your computer by manually clicking on the Add button for every chart. Thats one time process though.

[Read more excel charting hacks]

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

Share this tip with your colleagues

Excel and Power BI tips - Chandoo.org Newsletter

Get FREE Excel + Power BI Tips

Simple, fun and useful emails, once per week.

Learn & be awesome.

Welcome to Chandoo.org

Thank you so much for visiting. My aim is to make you awesome in Excel & Power BI. I do this by sharing videos, tips, examples and downloads on this website. There are more than 1,000 pages with all things Excel, Power BI, Dashboards & VBA here. Go ahead and spend few minutes to be AWESOME.

Read my storyFREE Excel tips book

Overall I learned a lot and I thought you did a great job of explaining how to do things. This will definitely elevate my reporting in the future.
Rebekah S
Reporting Analyst
Excel formula list - 100+ examples and howto guide for you

From simple to complex, there is a formula for every occasion. Check out the list now.

Calendars, invoices, trackers and much more. All free, fun and fantastic.

Advanced Pivot Table tricks

Power Query, Data model, DAX, Filters, Slicers, Conditional formats and beautiful charts. It's all here.

Still on fence about Power BI? In this getting started guide, learn what is Power BI, how to get it and how to create your first report from scratch.

One Response to “Say NO to Default Charts Forever!”

  1. [...] Also read : Create dash boards in Excel | How to draw impressive charts in Excel | Changing the default chart settings to impress everyone [...]

Leave a Reply