Table of Contents: Excel Chart Mastery

Introduction

Introduction

Welcome to the class! Let's get started with a brief overview of what we'll learn and how to navigate your new course.

Prerequisites

Prerequisites

Before diving into our course, there are a couple of important prerequisite lessons we'll need to learn. Don't worry - they're minimal!

Function basics

Let's review the basics of Excel formulas and functions to build a foundation for some of the capabilities we'll use when creating our charts.

Paste special

The Paste Special command has many uses, but we'll use it to convert formulas to values before we create our charts.

SUMIF

Excel's SUMIF function allows you to take the sum of a column or row of data conditional upon a particular criteria row.

SUMIFS

SUMIFS is very similar to Excel's SUMIF function, but it allows you to take the sum of a range based on multiple criteria rather than using a single condit

Data formatting

Why format data?

Before we jump into chart creation, we'll need to format our input data. Let's learn why data formatting is important!

Formatting input data

Before creating a chart, we'll need to carefully prepare a set of source data to ensure that it's clean and properly formatted. Without clean source data, it's likely that our chart will contain errors!

Formatting exercise

Now that you've learned how to prepare chart data, it's time to try things out for yourself. Can you convert a large spreadsheet of raw data into properly-formatted chart input?

Creating a chart

Creating a chart

Now that our data is properly formatted, we can move on to the good stuff: creating a simple chart. In this lesson, we'll explore chart basics and show a simple example of a chart in action.

Exercise: Create a chart

Now that you've learned how to create a chart, it's time to try things out for yourself. Can you convert our formatted input data into a beautiful Excel chart?

Formatting a chart

Formatting charts

Creating simple charts is just the beginning. We can also format our charts to make them easier to read - and better to look at!

Chart formatting exercise

Let's start with the chart we created in the last exercise, and add on some formatting options to make it even easier to read.

Data labels

For more data-centric charts, we can use an Excel tool called 'data labels' to ensure that exact values are displayed along with our graph visuals.

Data label exercise

Can you add data labels and data tables to our chart to make the values it displays explicit for viewers?

Linear regressions

Linear regressions

A 'linear regression' is a tool used to help identify a generic trend line within a scattered set of data. Let's learn about them here!

Regressions exercise

Can you create a linear regression line through a scatter plot to identify trends and make predictions about the future?

Conclusion

Conclusion

This marks the conclusion of our charts course! Check in here to review what we've learned.