Google Sheet is becoming the new normal to store and analyze your data! It is also one of the best alternatives to MS Excel, just in case you happen to use much of the Google products as compared to any other tools. Well, if that is the case then let me tell you that this is the right place to get started with the analytical tools of the Google Sheets
This guide will lead you through how to make a line graph in google sheets and render several insights into it. So just read the full post to find out the details.
The content of the post includes:
- Introduction to Line graph in google sheets
- How to make a Line graph in google sheets
- Insights into Line graph
- How to customize Line graph
Introduction to Line Graph in Google Sheets
Most often if you are working in some company that happens to deal with a lot of data and information storage and leads to bulky, data-heavy spreadsheets then it might be quite difficult to read and analyze the data every time. In such a case simply, add a graph-chart to represent the information in a much more legible manner.
Also if you are more of a Microsoft user, who has recently switched to Google Sheets, then let me clarify that similar to Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets also refers to all types of graphs as charts. Once you are done creating the chart for your data, the Chart Editor tool allows you to modify and customize the graphs and charts in Google Sheets as per your choice.
Out of all the charts, the line chart is the most basic and simple one. A line chart is used to find trends in data over time.
For example: If we want to create a graph to get trends in sales or profit margins each month, quarter, or year, etc, then a line graph is the best fit.
How to Make a Line Graph in Google Sheets
It is one of the easiest tasks that you can do while creating charts for your data!! Yes, inserting a line chart for your data in Google Sheets is really simple. You can begin with, open the Google Sheets spreadsheet on which you wanna work and select the required data that you want to use to create the chart.
Select Insert> Chart to create your chart. This will open the Chart Editor tool. The Chart Editor has several styled chart types that we can use for creating a graphical representation of our data. It ranges from the most basic line and bar charts for Google Sheets beginners to use, to more complex candlestick and radar charts for more advanced work. For more information on this, you can visit The Beginner’s Guide to Google Sheets
By default, it creates a basic line chart on the selected data. However, we can customize using the Chart Editor tool which opens on the right-side panel.
Insights into Line Graph
The graph basically depends on the data that we have selected or include for it. Obviously, we can customize the graph using the Chart Editor tool. However, the graph is mainly dependent on the type of data that we use. So, we can format the data for the same but the prime question is how would we do that? Following are the steps that illustrate how we can format our data.
- In the first column, enter a label to describe the data. These labels from the first column are basically shown on the horizontal axis.
- The first row of each column generally holds the category name/ the headers. However, it is optional though. The entries in the first row show up as labels in the legend of the graph.
- The other columns hold the extended categories needed to store the relevant date. We can also specify the type of data we want to store in each specified column. You can add the column name in the first row itself after the first column.
- The Other cells of the sheet are basically to hold the data that we need to analyze. These are the data points you’d like to display in the line graph.
- The other rows are the individual entries. Which is represented as an individual line in the chart.
How to Customize Line Graph
The best thing about line graphs in google sheets is that we can customize it as and when we like as per our choices. Following are the steps to do the same.
- First thing first, open the spreadsheet you want to work, in Google Sheets.
- Now, select the chart that you want to modify or change by simply double-clicking it.
- Click the customize button, at the right.
- Pick an option, from the following where wanna work or make modifications:
- Chart style: to change the looks of the chart.
- Chart & axis titles: to edit or format the title text of the line graph.
- Series: to change the line colors, the axis location, or add the error bars, data labels, or trendline into your graph.
- Legend: to change the legend position and text of the graph.
- Horizontal axis: to edit or format the axis text, or reverse the axis order of the graph.
- Vertical axis: to edit or format axis text, set a min or max value, or log scale to the graph.
- Gridlines: to add gridlines to the graph and also edit them.
I hope this article was insightful and that now you have a basic idea on how to make a line graph in google sheets. Keep following the site for more such technical references.