The chart block is part of Airtable Blocks, a Pro plan feature. Blocks let you extend the functionality of your bases: you can use blocks to bring new information into Airtable, visualize and summarize your records in colorful ways, and even directly integrate your Airtable bases with your favorite apps.
The chart block lets you visualize your table as any of the following chart types:
- bar chart
- line chart
- scatter plot
- pie chart
- donut chart
Watch this video to learn more about how to set up and use a chart block, or read on for further information.
When you first install a chart block, it'll automatically open the new block's settings page. From the settings, you can select the desired table and view you wish to visualize.
Next, you can pick which of the chart types you want to use: bar, line, scatter, pie, or donut. Here's some general tips on how to pick the correct chart.
- Bar charts are generally used to compare specific X-axis values, like the number of assignments each collaborator has in a project management base.
- Line charts are most often used to track changes over time, but they can also be used for when there is some other sequence, like stages in a pipeline.
- Scatter plots are most useful for showing how much one variable is affected by another variable.
- Pie and donut charts are both useful in situations where you want to compare the relative proportions of a data set's constituent subsets.
Once you've picked a chart, you'll need to pick a field for your chart's X-axis.
Certain field types offer additional customization choices for the X-axis. For example, if you pick a date field as the X-axis, you'll have the option to bucket the date values by week, month, quarter, and so on. You can also choose to whether or not to include data from cells that are empty in the specified field by selecting the "Include empty cells" option.
Once you've set up the X-axis, you'll need to set up the Y-axis. By default, the Y-axis is configured to show Count. This means that the chart will plot the number of records that have each X value on the Y-axis.
To use one of your other fields for the Y-axis, click the Field option. Note that you have to pick a numeric field.
You can either plot all of the values in the field, which is useful for a scatter plot, or you can aggregate the values to show the sum, minimum, maximum, or mean of all of the values, which is more useful for line or bar charts.
For a bar, line, or scatter chart, you can sort using one of the following options.
- View: Order in view
- X value: X-axis value (numerical order for number types, alphabetical for string, order of select options for single select / split multi select)
- Y value: Y-axis value (ie count, summary value, etc)
You can also choose to group by a third field, if you have any single select or single collaborator fields. This will give you more options for visually distinguishing between different bars, points, and lines.
The stack option stacks the different groups on top of each other.
For line graphs and scatter plots, you also have the option of setting the Y-axis to always start at zero.
Once you're done configuring the chart, you can hover over points on the chart to get more information about the underlying data. Clicking on a point or bar will bring up the relevant record, or a relevant list of records.
On a line chart or scatter plot, you can also zoom in by clicking and dragging your mouse to define a range.
You can also make pie and donut charts with chart block. A pie chart is used in situations when you want to illustrate proportionality: the arc lengths of the pie slices represent the relative proportions of the data set's constituent subsets. A donut chart is pretty similar to a pie chart, but—as you might guess—it has a hole in the middle.