What is a horizontal bar chart?

A horizontal bar chart places bars sideways to express quantities. When category names are long or there are many items, the labels stay readable, and the top-to-bottom flow makes it ideal for rankings. It's especially handy for survey results and satisfaction scores where you want labels presented in full.

For long labels, go horizontal

If your category names exceed about ten characters, you have eight or more items, or you want to display a ranking — any of these makes a horizontal bar chart a strong candidate.

When to use it

Ranking display

Top-10 articles, top-5 sales, anything where you want both rank and quantity.

Survey results

Surveys often have long answer choices that fit better as horizontal bars.

Region or country comparison

Long region or country names display in full, no abbreviation needed.

Time or duration comparison

Task duration and similar — horizontal length intuitively expresses elapsed time.

Tips for making one well

1. Sort largest at the top

The convention for horizontal bars is largest at the top, smallest at the bottom. Eyes flow downward, so this order reads naturally. For time-series, sort oldest at the top instead.

2. Don't truncate labels

The biggest advantage of horizontal bars is that long names display in full. Widen the chart if the Y-axis labels start to get cut off.

3. Show values inside or at the end of each bar

Horizontal bars pair well with value labels. Placing the value at the right end of each bar lets readers absorb both length and number at the same time.

4. Start the axis at zero

Like vertical bars, length-based charts must start at zero on the value axis. Starting partway up exaggerates differences.

FAQ

If labels are short and you're comparing across time, go vertical. If labels are long, you have many items, or you want to show a ranking, go horizontal.

Horizontal bars tolerate more items than vertical. A practical range is 5–15 items. Beyond 15, narrow down to the top items or use a scrollable display.

Yes — use "Add series" to display multiple series side by side. To stack the breakdown within each row, use the stacked horizontal bar chart; for vertical stacking, see the stacked bar chart.

PNG and JPG export at 2× (Retina-equivalent) resolution — high enough for A4 print or large on-screen display.

Make a Horizontal Bar Chart