Is this reddit now? A post with a link to a website with a picture. Great stuff.
Should I use a pie chart?
11–20 of 36 posts
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#12I wasn't aware they were controversial. I had to google to find some arguments against pie charts https://www.data-to-viz.com/caveat/pie.html
God I'd forgotten about that awful Steve Jobs one:
https://s3.amazonaws.com/edwardtufte.com/pie_apple_marketsha...
(the green segment is made to look larger than the purple one because of a perspective trick)
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#13I wasn't aware they were controversial. I had to google to find some arguments against pie charts https://www.data-to-viz.com/caveat/pie.html
Even then, it's pretty ridiculous to say that this is a valid argument against using pie charts. It's a valid argument against using them when you've got multiple similarly sized slices, or some other thing that would make them the wrong choice, but there are great reasons to not use most visualizations in incompatible contexts. Just like anything else in graphic design, these things should be used when they are better at conveying a point than other methods and not used when they aren't. Coming up with rules like this is like saying "never use garlic" and then coming up with every dish from chocolate pudding to iced tea that's not made better with garlic. Use the right tool for the job. It's design "rules" like this that will inspire some insecure "Ha! Gotcha! So-called expert!" type of nerd rant from a developer in a meeting where I'm presenting work I've done as a designer.
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#14why does this chart look like it's on ketamine?
they have a site dedicated to pie charts but couldn't afford a real circle?
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#15Reminds me of this site: https://shouldiuseacarousel.com/
There is argument to be made for a kind of carousel: variant selection and product photos in shops.
When I shop for clothes online, I click through colors and sometimes through photos to see clothes from different angles or zoomed in. It's a sneaky kind of carousel that is actually useful.
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#16I wasn't aware they were controversial. I had to google to find some arguments against pie charts https://www.data-to-viz.com/caveat/pie.html
> In the adjacent pie chart, try to figure out which group is the biggest one [...]. You will probably struggle to do so and this is why pie charts must be avoided.
It's not that bad when the purpose of the pie is not to figure out which group is the biggest.
I find the pie pretty appropriate when the goal is to figure out
- if all the groups are more or less the same
- if one or several groups are way bigger than the other groups
- if one or several groups are way smaller than the other groups
Not saying pies are the best for this (bar charts work well too), just saying it works well.
> try to order them by value
I mean, why would you not order them already inside the chart? So that the reader doesn't have to do it.
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#17I wasn't aware they were controversial. I had to google to find some arguments against pie charts https://www.data-to-viz.com/caveat/pie.html
> I had to google to find some arguments against pie charts
Can you give me any arguments for pie charts? I also disagree with that article that the best alternative to a pie chart is a bar chart.
Whenever your doing any sort of data visualization you should always ask "How does this representation convey information that cannot be represented in a table?"
Can you provide an example where a pie chart would tell you more than could be conveyed in a table?
Tables are incredibly information dense, have an unambiguous ordering and can easily scale to expressing 5-6 dimensions of information in the exact same space that a pie-chart can convey. Tables are limited in that they work best when representing a very small number of observations, but pie-charts and bar-charts share this same problem without any of the benefits of tables.
If a table won't cut it, then you probably have enough data that a scatter plot is your best choice. Scatter plots also can easily handle an extra 2-3 dimensions (color, scale, and shape) of information.
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#18I wasn't aware they were controversial. I had to google to find some arguments against pie charts https://www.data-to-viz.com/caveat/pie.html
Even then, it's pretty ridiculous to say that this is a valid argument against using pie charts. It's a valid argument against using them when you've got multiple similarly sized slices, or some other thing that would make them the wrong choice, but there are great reasons to not use most visualizations in incompatible contexts. Just like anything else in graphic design, these things should be used when they are bett…
Can you give me a single example where a pie chart would better convey information than a table?
The only visualization more useless than a pie-chart is a 3d pie-chart.
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#19PacMan pie charts are acceptable https://images.app.goo.gl/JoYtDHfGaCXsTpGK7
Also cases where someone wants to visually represent exactly how much of a pie they've eaten.
Re: Should I use a pie chart?
#20Being against pie charts is a great example of mid-wit (angry, ranting about nothing). The anti pie chart crowd recognises that other plots can achieve everything the pie chard does, and more. But the fail in this understanding is the assumption of "more is more". Sometimes you don't want readers getting down into the details. Sometimes you don't want readers comparing the relative sizes of pie segments (which the human eye tends to do on bar charts). Sometimes pie charts just suit the overall layout of the document they're part of.
tl;dr be mindful there's often a better plot to use than a pie chart, but if you want to use a pie chart, go for it.