Line Chart Maker

How the Line Chart Maker works

Line chart maker: getting a good result

Data. The first column is the x axis. If every entry is a date such as 2025-03 or 2025-03-14, the axis becomes a time axis and uneven gaps between dates are shown as uneven gaps on the line. If every entry is a number, the axis is a numeric scale. Anything else is treated as a category and spaced evenly in the order given. Every column after the first that contains numbers becomes its own line, and a blank cell simply leaves a gap in that series rather than dropping the row.

Line style. Straight joins the points with segments and is the honest default for measured data. Smooth uses a monotone curve that passes through every point without overshooting, which suits trends where the reader is meant to see the shape rather than the individual values. Step holds each value until the next point and is right for quantities that change at discrete moments, such as a price list or a headcount.

Y axis from zero. Starting the axis at zero keeps the slope honest: a line that climbs from 1,200 to 2,300 looks like roughly a doubling, which it is. Fit to data starts the axis at the lowest value instead, which magnifies small movements. Use it when the variation is the story and say so in the title, because the same data drawn both ways can tell two very different tales.

Markers, labels and format. Point markers put a small circle at every data point so the reader can see where the measurements actually are; hide them when there are hundreds of points and the line alone is cleaner. Title and axis labels are optional. Number format applies to the y axis ticks: Thousands separator writes 12,500. Percent expects fractions, so 0.25 shows as 25%; a whole number such as 1234 shows as 123,400%, so convert it to a fraction first.

Export. Download SVG gives a vector file for documents, slides and web pages; Download PNG renders it at 1×, 2× or 3× the preview width on a white background; Copy SVG puts the markup on the clipboard. The chart is drawn in the browser from the text you pasted and nothing is sent anywhere.

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