Ravindra BagaleCourses & study guides

8. Charts

8.11 Sparklines

In short: Sparklines are tiny charts inside a cell – perfect next to a table row.

Sparklines are tiny charts inside a cell – perfect next to a table row.

Steps in Excel

  1. Select the empty cells where sparklines go (e.g. F2:F4 next to each city's six months).
  2. Insert › Sparklines › Line (or Column, Win/Loss) › Data Range B2:E4-style range of values › OK.
  3. Sparkline tab › tick High Point and Low Point; choose a style.
  4. Sparkline › Group › Axis › Same for All Sparklines when you want to compare levels across rows.

Worked example. City summary table with a line sparkline for Jul–Dec per city; the markers show every city peaking in Nov.

Ravindra Bagale's Tip

Each sparkline has its own axis – so even a small change in a small city looks big. Many students draw the wrong conclusion: "Kolhapur grew as much as Pune". If you want to compare, set Axis › Same for All Sparklines.

Practice task

Add line sparklines with high/low points for six cities and column sparklines for daily orders of the last 14 days.