Not a category in the strict sense, more a hand-picked shortlist. If you're not sure which chart type fits your data, start here and work outward.
A quick look at what's in here. Click through to open any one of them.
This page collects chart templates, and it's worth being upfront about what that means: it's a shortlist we've put together, not a formal category like bar charts or maps elsewhere on this site. Bar chart, line chart, pie chart, choropleth map, scatter plot and treemap: six templates chosen because between them they answer almost every question a reporter, analyst or student runs into when a spreadsheet needs to become a picture.
Each one solves a different problem. A bar chart ranks categories against each other; a line chart tracks a number as it moves through time. Pie charts show how a whole splits into parts, though only when there aren't too many of them, while a choropleth map colors a shape by a value so a country or state can carry its own number. Scatter plots check whether two numeric variables move together, and a treemap packs a hierarchy, categories inside categories, into nested rectangles sized by value. If your data doesn't fit any of these six, it's a sign you need a more specific template, not that these are wrong.
We picked this set because it's a reasonable default, not because it's exhaustive. PlotSet has dozens of chart types built for narrower jobs: dumbbell charts for before-and-after comparisons, population pyramids for age-and-gender demographics, Sankey diagrams for flows. Start here if you're not sure what you need; move to a dedicated chart category once you know.
Each one opens its own free maker with sample data already loaded.
You've got a spreadsheet and a rough idea of what story it tells, but no fixed idea of the shape. Walking through these six against your data (categories, time series, parts of a whole, geography, correlation, hierarchy) usually narrows it down fast.
These are the six types most readers already know how to read, which matters more than novelty when the goal is getting a point across quickly. Nobody has to learn a new visual language to understand a bar chart.
If you're evaluating whether PlotSet fits how your team publishes charts, these templates are the fastest way to see the upload-to-embed path end to end without hunting through a full category taxonomy first.
A single ad-hoc chart for a blog post or a one-off analysis, where you don't need to think about a whole family of related layouts, just the one shape that fits the data in front of you.
From a spreadsheet to a published chart, step by step.
Ranking categories, a trend over time, parts of a whole, values by location, two variables against each other, or a nested hierarchy: figure out which of these your spreadsheet actually represents before opening a template.
Each of the six links below goes to its own template page with sample data already loaded, so you can see the expected column layout before uploading anything of your own.
Upload a CSV or Excel file, paste rows directly, or connect a Google Sheet so the chart updates automatically when the source data changes.
Publish for an interactive embed with hover tooltips and responsive resizing, or export a static PNG, SVG or PDF for a deck, article or report.
Open the editor and start from any template in this category. Sample data is already loaded.
Open the editorUse a bar chart. It's the most accurately read way to compare values across categories: length maps directly to value, and readers don't have to estimate angles or areas the way they do with a pie chart. Sort the bars by size unless there's a natural order like months or age groups, which makes the ranking obvious at a glance.
Free to start with 300+ templates. No credit card required.
