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A Stacked Area Chart is one of the best-suited visualization designs you can use to display the trend of key variables in your data.
In other words, you can use the chart to track the trend of key metrics over time.
There are many types of charts and graphs but this chart is amazingly easy to read and interpret because of more space available in this chart different colors can present different data points by showing a trend as well.
If your goal is to access a ready-to-go and visually stunning Stacked Area Graph, you’ve got to think beyond Excel’s inbuilt charts. The solution is not to ditch the spreadsheet app you’ve used for many years.
You have an option of supercharging it with a particular add-in access ready-to-use Stacked Area Chart in Excel.
In this blog, you’ll learn the following:
Before we dive right into the blog’s core, let’s address the following question:
A Stacked Area Chart in Excel is a visualization design you can use to display trends and patterns of two or more variables in data. Besides, it shows relationships between variables over time.
The chart is amazingly easy to read and interpret.
Each area under the line in the chart is shaded from its peak to a common baseline. The top line corresponds to the aggregate value when summing across all groups.
You can use the chart to:
The height of each curve shows the overall trend of the variable under study.
How to read a Stacked Area Chart in Excel should never be a stressful affair for you. Keep reading to discover more.
Take a look at the table below.
Can you provide a coherent story of what’s going on?
| Products | Mobile | TV | Battery | Charger | Cable |
| Jan | 20 | 18 | 15 | 25 | 10 |
| Feb | 16 | 14 | 12 | 20 | 15 |
| Mar | 25 | 10 | 20 | 18 | 30 |
| Apr | 12 | 12 | 18 | 22 | 18 |
| May | 22 | 15 | 10 | 35 | 20 |
| Jun | 26 | 20 | 13 | 30 | 25 |
| Jul | 30 | 40 | 35 | 15 | 20 |
| Aug | 45 | 35 | 20 | 25 | 30 |
| Sep | 50 | 30 | 25 | 35 | 20 |
| Oct | 15 | 20 | 35 | 25 | 40 |
| Nov | 40 | 35 | 25 | 10 | 20 |
| Dec | 16 | 25 | 45 | 12 | 30 |
Note the difference after visualizing the data using the Stacked Area Chart in Excel.
How to create Stacked Area Chart in Excel should never waste your valuable time. Keep reading to discover more.
By having focus on the colors and the shape of the curve you will know the importance of data visualization. Curves on an uptrend depict growth. On the other hand, curves on a downtrend show decline.
Pay special attention to the largest and smallest slices based on the color.
The Stacked Area Chart also displays part-to-whole relationship insights into raw data. In other words, you can also track totals across key categories in your data using the visualization design.
Avoid focusing on the slopes of the colored curves because they may distort your findings.
Secondly, focus on the largest and smallest slices based on the color.
Excel has inbuilt charts you can use to extract answers from your data. However, the tool does not natively support the Stacked Area Chart in Excel. In other words, you’ll never find the chart’s template in the freemium tool.
The most viable option available for you is to supercharge Excel with a particular add-in called ChartExpo.
So, what is ChartExpo?
ChartExpo has an in-built library with amazing custom charts designed purposely to save you time.
ChartExpo is cloud-hosted, which makes it extremely light. You have a 100% guarantee that your computer or Excel won’t be slowed down.
Besides, you can export your charts in SVG.
The cutting-edge application does not require coding or programming skills, unlike other data visualization add-ons. More so, it has an ultra-friendly UI for everyone to use.
This tool comes pre-loaded with a ready-made Stacked Area Chart in Excel, plus amazing other advanced visualization designs to offset the missing ones in the application. Use ChartExpo to produce graphs that are incredibly easy to read and understand.
You can easily access the chart in your ChartExpo. You’ll learn more about this cutting-edge tool in the next section.
You don’t want to miss this.
Click here to install ChartExpo into your Excel. Once you’re done, follow the easy steps below.
You chart will appear as shown below:
To add additional details, such as title in your chart, follow the steps below:
Save your new changes by clicking the Save Changes button and check out the final chart below.
There’re 6 main types of area charts, namely;
Let’s check them out in great detail.
Simple area chart is like a line chart but underneath that line area is filled with color.
A Stacked Area Chart is an area graph variant that visualizes data using a series of stacked curves differentiated using contrasting colors.
The 100% Stacked Area Chart is an extension of an Area Graph. The difference comes in the vertical axis scale.
As the name implies, a 3-D Area Chart is an Area Graph variant that uses three dimensions to display insights into data.
3D Stacked Area Chart uses three dimensions to display insights. More so, the visualization design shares some attributes with the Stacked Area Chart.
This visualization design is an extension of the 100% stacked area chart. It uses percentages to show stacked segments.
Both visualization designs use color to show the magnitude of change of key data points.
The key difference lies in stacks. One of the charts stacked rows to display trends and patterns of key variables in your data.
The Stacked Area Chart in Excel is prone to clutter. And this means the chart has a limit of the number of variables it can visualize with clarity and coherence.
Secondly, there’re other charts best-suited in displaying part-to-whole relationships, such as a Stacked Bar Chart.
A Stacked Area Chart is one of the best-suited visualization designs you can use to display the trend of key variables in your data.
In other words, you can use the chart to track the trend of key metrics over time. The Stacked Area Chart in Excel is amazingly easy to read and interpret.
We recommend installing third-party apps, such as ChartExpo, in Excel to access ready-to-use Stacked Area Charts.
ChartExpo is an add-in for Excel that’s loaded with insightful and easy-to-interpret Stacked Area Graphs, plus plenty of more amazing charts. You don’t need programming or coding skills to visualize your data using the Stacked Area Chart in Excel in ChartExpo.
Sign up for a 7-days free trial today to access Stacked Area Charts that are amazingly easy to interpret and visually appealing to your target audience.
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