What is it for?
The scatter plot template is a powerful and multifaceted tool for displaying the relationship between two variables. Use it to identify anomalies, see how one variable affects another, or to see a correlation, pattern, trend, or relationship.
With this template, you can create two-dimensional scatter plots, bubble charts, Hans Rosling charts, box plots, beeswarm charts and violin plots.
Extra information can be encoded using colour, shape and size. Data can also be divided into multiple smaller datasets using the Grid of charts feature.
How to get started
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To make a simple scatter plot chart, all you need is two columns of data: one for the x (horizontal) axis and one for the y (vertical) axis.
Country Name Region GDP per capita, PPP Life expectancy at birth, total (years) Income group Bosnia and Herzegovina Europe & Central Asia 15893.06017 75.3 Upper middle income Lebanon Middle East & North Africa 12986.91287 75.047 Lower middle income Grenada Latin America & Caribbean 13688.29777 74.936 Upper middle income Malaysia East Asia & Pacific 26333.1597 74.884 Upper middle income Slovak Republic Europe & Central Asia 32534.95387 74.7146342 High income - Each row is plotted as a dot, and the spread of dots on the chart shows the relationship between the two metrics.
- Additional columns can be used to set the colour, size and shape of the dots, or to create interactive controls and custom popups.
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To style the dots, head to the Scatter settings.
There, you can specify the Opacity and Size of the dots and change their shape.
TIP: You can find out more about different shapes for your Scatter plot, here.
If you want the shapes to get bigger or smaller relative to the. chart size, turn on Scale with chart.
Moreover, you can customize the outlines, by setting an opacity, width and color value.
In addition, you can opt for WebGL renderer for particilarly large datasets, as it tends to be more performant.
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Colors are highly customizable in a scatter plot visualization and it all depends on the type of data bound to the Colors data binding.
You can find out more about how colors work in a scatter plot, here.
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If your data has a column with years or dates, you can create an animated scatter showing change over time. Select a Time column in the Select columns to visualise panel to create a slider and choose one or more Name columns so the template knows which rows represent the same thing. Read more about creating an animated scatter plot here.
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- If you're overwhelmed by the number of points, you can choose a Filter column to create a menu to switch between subsets of the data. Read more about creating a scatter plot with a filter here.
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- Flourish offers a host of options on how to manage the labels of a scatter plot. Head here for a deep dive! It is also possible to use selective labels.
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- You can include as many Info for popups columns as you like to display inside your popups, and advanced users can even use HTML and CSS to pull in pictures or videos from a column of image or video URLs. Read more about adding custom popups.