Naming Basics Best practice recommendations are to create a chart placing independent variables on the horizontal, x-axis and dependent variables on the vertical, y-axis.

How Excel Charts Work A chart has an x-axis range and a y-axis range to show the correlation between two different data sets. The x-axis is the horizontal category line.

If you have uneven distribution of data in your Excel chart, here is a better way to change the automatic axis settings.

We discuss a comment on a previous post stating that the text of labels on the vertical axis of graphs must be horizontal by discussing the pros and cons of four possible positions for these labels.

When you use Excel's Chart Wizard to create a chart, by default the chart takes on the number formats used in the worksheet that includes the charted data. Mary Ann Richardson shows you a way to ...