In this blog you will learn about how to create Racing Bar Chart in Tableau. Racing charts or racing bar charts are a vibrant and engaging way to show changes in rankings or stock exchanges over time. Unlike regular bar charts that give you a single snapshot, racing charts animate the data, allowing you to see how objects move, trend and compare across multiple locations over time. These are perfect creations for listing, displaying or visualizing changes in any data where tracking changes over time is important. Racing charts’ animated data animation is studious and complex yet clearly communicated.
Components of Racing Bar Chart in Tableau
- Categories: These represent the groups being compared, such as products, regions, or teams. Each category is usually shown as a bar that moves over time according to its ranking or value.
- Values: These are the metrics tracked for each category, such as sales figures, scores, or rankings.
- Time dimension: Time is important in a racing chart, as it defines the period during which the data changes. The chart animates to show how the values evolve over time.
- Bars: The bars represent the categories and their values. As time progresses, the length and position of these bars change to reflect the updated data.
- Axis: The axis shows the values or rankings, which serve as a reference for the length and position of the bars.
- Labels: The labels provide additional information, such as category names and specific values, making the data easier to understand.
- Animation: The main feature of a racing chart is its animation, which visually shows how the rankings or values change over time.
Use Case of Racing Bar Chart in Tableau
- Sales performance tracking: Use racing charts to compare sales across regions, products, or sales teams over time, highlighting changes in market share.
- Market share analysis: Visualize changes in market share among competitors to understand changes in market dominance.
- Project management: Track the progress of tasks or milestones in projects, helping to identify potential delays or issues.
- Sports performance: Compare the performance of teams or athletes over a season, visually showing rankings or scores.
- Economic indicators: Economists use racing charts to visualize changes in indicators such as GDP growth or unemployment rates across regions.
- Educational tool: Racing charts can illustrate historical trends, compare educational performance, or demonstrate changes in educational metrics.
- Election results: Show how candidates’ positions evolve as votes are counted over time.
Dataset description
The dataset has information about sales of products with six attributes: Category, Product, Quantity, Unit Price, Total Price, and Profit. This gives information about how well different things are doing and how profitable they are. You can download the dataset from here.
Steps to create Racing Bar Chart in Tableau
Step 1: Open Tableau
Step 2: Click on Text file to connect with Tableau
Step 3: Browse csv file (or other file format as your need) and click on Open
Step 4: Click on Sheet 1 (Worksheet) to make visual (Doughnut)
Step 5: Go to Analysis tab and select Create Calculated Field…
Step 6: Named the field and type following function; click on OK.
Step 7: Drag Rank to Rows and Sales to Columns
Step 8: Drag Profit to Color and Label under Marks card
Step 9: Click on arrow of Rank in Rows and select Compute Using to select Product
Step 10: Again, click on arrow of Rank and select Discrete
Step 11: Click on Dropdown with Standard and select Entire View
Step 12: Drag Sales to Filters shelf and click on Next
Step 13: Select At least and type 1 in input field, then click on OK
Step 14: Drag-n-Drop Date to Pages shelf
Step 15: Click on arrow of Date in Pages shelf and select Month with month and year
Step 16: Click on Format tab and select Animations…
Step 17: Select On and select Very Slow in Duration dropdown
Output:
Conclusion:
Racing charts are a powerful way to visualize changes in rankings or values over time. Their animated nature makes them an engaging tool for understanding complex data, tracking trends, and telling data-driven stories. By creating and customizing racing charts in Tableau, you can make your data analysis more impactful and accessible.
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