Tableau: Diverging bar chart
In this post we will see how to make diverging bar chart in Tableau. Additionaly, it will be also shown how to manipulate with number formats.
Lets start with the connection to the Sample-Superstore.
In order to not have too much data, we will make the report just for randomly chosen State, e.g. Washington. Putting State in Filters panel and choosing Washington, double clicking Profit and Sales, and then choosing horizontal bars in Show Me, we will have this preview:
Since we want to have diverging bar chart, 1st step is that we make one of the measures negative. To have that, we just have to make calculated field:
Putting this new calculated field -Sales and Profit into the Columns, Order Date in Rows and showing all mark labels, we will get our first diverging bar chart :)
We can stop here, but it makes sense to get rid of all of these negative numbers (we did not have negative Sales!). Right click on randomly chosen number, clicking Format and choosing SUM(-Sales) in Fields will give us possibility to play with numbers.
We want to change the number format on two places:
1. Axis tab: Scale -> Numbers
2. Pane tab: Default -> Numbers
Clicking on Numbers and choosing firstly Number (Custom) and then Custom, we will have the possibility to change manually the numbers format:
In the case that we do not click firstly the Number (Custom), corresponding field for manual change will be blank. What we have to do here is to get rid of minus sign after ; (semicolon).
The same thing we have to repeat for 2nd tab Pane.
At the end we can change the Colors of both measures to have nicer report.
As we can see, is it really easy to see on one graph the trend of both measures.
Tableau original workbook (downloadable)
In this post I tried to share all important info how to create nice and useful diverging bar chart in Tableau.
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