Tutorials

Learn to visualize your data like an expert with these practical how-tos for presentation, analysis, and understanding.

Introducing a Course for Mapping in R

Mapping geographic data in R can be tricky, because there are so many…

How to Edit R Charts in Adobe Illustrator

A detailed guide for R users who want to polish their charts in the popular graphic design app for readability and aesthetics.

How to Make an Animated Map in R, Part 4

In the the last part of the four-part series, you make a longer animation with more data and annotate.

Transitioning Map, Part 3: Animate Change Over Time

How to make a bunch of maps and string them together to show change.

Transitioning Map, Part 2: Refining the Format and Layout

How to make a more readable and more visually accurate map, before you dive into the big transitions.

Transitioning Map, Part 1: Mapping Irregular Data with Interpolation in R

Rarely do you have evenly-spaced data across an entire geographic space. Here is a way to fill in the gaps.

How to Visualize Proportions in R

There are many ways to show parts of a whole. Here are quick one-liners for the more common ones.

How to Make Beeswarm Plots in R to Show Distributions

Try the more element-based approach instead of your traditional histogram or boxplot.

Make a Moving Bubbles Chart to Show Clustering and Distributions

Use a force-directed graph to form a collection of bubbles and move them around based on data.

How to Make Square Pie Charts in R

Instead of traditional pie charts that rely on angles and arc lengths to show parts of a whole, try this easier-to-read version.

Annotating Charts in R

Let the data speak for itself they say. That doesn't work a lot of the time, and when that happens, you need to explain.

A Course for Visualizing Time Series Data in R

Learn to visualize temporal patterns in a couple of days.

Drawing Lines and Segments in R

Show connections and changes over time with start and end points.

Drawing Circles and Ellipses in R

Whether you use circles as visual encodings or as a way to highlight areas of a plot, there are functions at your disposal.

Drawing Squares and Rectangles in R

R makes it easy to add squares and rectangles to your plots, but it gets a little tricky when you have a bunch to draw at once. The key is to break it down to the elements.

Voronoi Diagram and Delaunay Triangulation in R

The deldir package by Rolf Turner makes the calculations and plotting straightforward, with a few lines of code.

Adding Legends in R

Make sure you explain your visual encodings so that others can interpret them.

How to Make an Interactive Stacked Area Chart

Stacked area charts let you see categorical data over time. Interaction allows you to focus on specific categories without losing sight of the big picture.