Customize the horizontal axis labels

Excel provides very few options for formatting horizontal axis labels. You cannot format different axis labels with different colors or font sizes. Conditional formatting also only works in some cases. You need to implement some tricks to format the horizontal axis, for example:

Customize the vertical axis labels

Excel provides very few options for formatting vertical axis labels. All axis labels are a single object - you can change the font size and color or apply effects to all labels at the same time. Even the gradient fill with the color of the axis labels works for us as for the whole item and not for individual objects.

How to add an axis pointer

Since our school times, we became familiar with drawing charts with arrows on the axes, but in Excel charts, the axes are just lines. You can customize them differently: change their width, color, and transparency; hide any axis or its labels; add the secondary horizontal or vertical axis; add, hide, or display a part of axes labels; etc.

Conditional formatting for chart axes

One of the useful tricks to attain the attention of the audience and improve the effect of presenting your data is to use axis label formatting customized for the specific value ranges:

Creating a chart with critical zones

Periodical processes like the volume of support service calls often have critical zones that indicate a severe problem that needs to be investigated and mitigated. This tip shows how to reveal and emphasize those critical zones for analysis.

How to create a step Area chart for the Mosaic plot in Excel

This is a second part of the tip How to create a Mosaic plot in Excel. The first part describes how to prepare the data for the step Area chart created in this part.

How to hide points on the chart axis

Excel proposes very useful formatting for numeric data that can be applied for cells and some chart elements. For example, the standard formatting can be used when you need or want to omit some points of the chart axis, e.g., the zero point. Below you will find how to hide specific points on the chart axis using standard formatting and using a custom label format:

Gantt chart with progress or progress Gantt chart

Gantt chart is a horizontal bar chart that is often used in project management applications.

How to create a funny dog breeds lifespan chart in Excel

Span chart, also known as a range bar graph (range column graph), floating bar graph, difference graph, high-low graph, used to display the specific variable value range. Span charts are ideal for comparing ranges, and typically, each variable represents a particular category. All values for the selected category fall between minimal and maximal values that correspond to lower and upper bounds of the interval.

How to change axis labels order in a bar chart

Excel can display the data series in an inconvenient order for bar charts. For example, if you have a table with tasks for a Gantt chart, after creating a bar chart (see how to create a simple Gantt chart for more details), you expect to see tasks on the list arranged from top to bottom. Unexpectedly, Excel displays them in the reverse order:

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