Not everyone is a Tableau guru, at least not yet. To help Tableau rookies, we’re starting from square one with the Tableau Essentials blog series. The series is intended to be an easy-to-read reference on the basics of using Tableau Software, particularly Tableau Desktop. Since there are so many cool features to cover in Tableau, the series will include several different posts.

The stacked bar chart is great for adding another level of detail inside of a horizontal bar chart. You can do this by adding another dimension to your horizontal bar chart that will further divide the measure into sub-groups. The sub-groups are then color-coded on each bar as illustrated in the example below: 

Figure 1: Stacked bar chart.

The example above shows sales volume by state with a further division of sales by customer segment (by adding the Customer Segment field to the Color shelf). This view is not ideal for comparing individual sales volume by customer segment across states, such as Corporate sales in Arizona versus Small Business sales in Wyoming. 

On the other hand, the view does allow you to compare overall sales by state and the sub-division of those sales by customer segment within that state. For instance, we can see that California is clearly the champion in sales volume out of these states. Within California, it is clear that Corporate sales lead the way, followed by Home Office, Consumer, and finally, Small Business. Like every chart type, the effectiveness of a stacked bar chart depends on what you’re analyzing.

Other Chart Types

Here is the complete list of chart types from the Show Me menu. Be sure to check back often as we continue to release new articles in each chart type in this sub-series.

Introduction

1. Text Table (Crosstab)
2. Heat Map
3. Highlight Table
4. Symbol Map
5. Filled Map
6. Pie Chart
7. Horizontal Bar Chart
8. Stacked Bar Chart
9. Side-by-Side Bar Chart
10. Treemap
11. Circle View
12. Side-by-Side Circle View
13. Line Charts (Continuous & Discrete)
14. Dual-Line Chart (Non-Synchronized)
15. Area Charts (Continuous & Discrete)
16. Scatter Plot
17. Histogram
18. Box-and-Whisker Plot
19. Gantt Chart
20. Bullet Graph
21. Packed Bubbles

More Tableau Essentials

Want to learn more about Tableau? We have several posts outlining all of Tableau’s fantastic features. Check out the full list on our Tableau Essentials blog channel.

As always, let us know if you have any questions or comments about this post or Tableau in general. If you’re looking for personalized training or help with something bigger, contact us directly!

Contact Us