Sketch Your Data : A Visual Reference Guide

Selecting the right visual encoding for your data is crucial for effective data insights. Sketch Your Data is a reference guide for key data visualization techniques with examples to help you choose the most appropriate approach.

What role do you want your data visualization to play?

Comparison
Proportion
Flow
Trend
Distribution
Relationship
Location

Bars / Columns Great for comparing quantities.

One of the most common ways to show proportion and comparison

  • Bar Chart Bar Chart Image
  • Stacked Bar Stacked Bar Chart Image
  • Histogram Histogram Image
  • Radial Bar Radial Bar Image
  • Lollipop Lollipop Image
  • Spine Chart Spine Chart Image
  • Population Pyramid Population Pyramid Image
  • Bullet Graph Bullet Graph
  • Waterfall Chart Waterfall Chart
  • Gantt Chart Gantt Chart

Lines Ideal for showing trends over time.

Useful when you want to display trends, flow and proportion

  • Line Chart Line Chart Image
  • Bollinger Bands Bollinger Bands Chart Image
  • Density Plots Density Lines Chart Image
  • Parallel Coordinates Parallel Coordinates Chart Image
  • Stream Graph Stream Graph Chart Image
  • Step Line Step Line Chart Image
  • Ribbon Chart Step Line Chart Image
  • Area Chart Area Chart Image
  • Ridge Line Chart Ridge Line Chart Image
  • Slope Chart Slope Chart Image

Scatter Used to determine relationships between variables.

Helpful when you want to explore relationship between numerical variables

  • Scatter Plot Scatter Plots Chart Image
  • Bubble Chart Bubble Chart Image
  • Hexbin Plot Hexbin Plot Image
  • Connected Scatterplot Connected Scatterplot Image
  • QQ Plot QQ Plot Image

Part-to-Whole These charts are used to show how parts contribute to the whole.

  • Circle Packing Circle Packing Plot Image
  • Sunburst Sunburst Chart Image
  • Treemap Treemap Chart Image
  • Pie Chart Pie Chart Image
  • Donut Chart Donut Chart Image
  • Venn Diagram Venn Diagram Image
  • Polar Area Diagram Polar Area Diagram Image
  • Waffle Chart Waffle Chart Image
  • Marimekko Chart Marimekko Chart Image

Geo-Spatial Geo-spatial charts are used to represent data related to geography.

  • Choropleth Map Choropleth Map Image
  • Cartogram Cartogram Map Image
  • Hexbin Map Hexbin Map Image
  • Bubble Map Bubble Map Image

Others Various other chart types for specialized data visualization.

  • Network Diagram Network Diagram Image
  • Decision Tree Decision Tree Diagram Image
  • Box and Whiskers Plot Box and Whiskers Plot Image
  • Violin Plot Violin Plot Image
  • Sankey Diagram Sankey Diagram Image
  • Chord Diagram Chord Diagram Image
  • Radar Chart Radar Chart Image
  • T-SNE T-SNE Image
  • Voronoi Plot Voronoi Diagrams Image
  • Rose Chart Rose Chart Image
  • Word Cloud Word Cloud Image
  • Dot Plot Dotplot Image
  • Heatmap Heatmap Image
  • More to come...