"How to Create a Pie Chart in Excel 2007?"

Create a worksheet as follow as we will use it to demonstrate the steps to create a pie chart in Excel 2007:

We can see that WindSports Sales are broken apart into categories. Vertically, in Column A, we can see that WindSport has categorized the sales according to the products that they sell: boomerangs, kites and toys. Horizontally, in Row 2, we can see that WindSport has categorized the sales according to the sales channels that they use for selling: In Store, Web Site and Mail Order. In addition, they have listed totals for each category and an overall total in the lower-right corner.

For our first Chart we would like to show how each product total contributes to the overall total. This means that we are comparing three "parts" (boomerangs, kites, toys) to the overall total to see what proportion or percentage that each contributes to the whole. Anytime you have this situation (comparing parts to the overall total), a Pie chart type is an excellent choice.

To create and customize a pie chart
1. Highlight the range A3:A5, then hold the Ctrl key, and select the second range E3:E5 (you are selecting two ranges of cells that are not adjacent to each other).

2. From the Insert Tab, in the Charts group, point to the Pie chart icon.

3. Click on the Pie chart icon and then point to the first option. As you can see, Excel gives you a description of what the chart should be used for. As you learn how to make charts, you can read these as you are trying to decide which chart is best for your message.

4. Click on this first option to create your Pie chart. You can see that it placed a pie chart on top of the worksheet and opened the three contextual tabs for charts.

5. To change the size of the chart, hold the Shift key and point to the upper left corner of the chart and when you see a diagonally pointing black arrow, click and drag inward. You should change the size to about the same size as seen in figure below:

6. Click on the Quick Layout icon on the Chart Tools Design tab and point to the "Layout 1" option.

7. You should see that the Quick Layout added a Chart Title, and the category names with percentages that convey how much each part contributes to the whole.

8. Click on the More icon in the Chart Styles group.

9. After you click on the "See More Selections" arrow, choose "Style 10".

10. After clicking on Style 10 you should see this:

11. Now we need to change the Chart Title. Click once on the Chart Title, then click a second time so that an I-beam cursor is flashing in the Chart Title.

12. Press Ctrl + A (keyboard shortcut for Select All).

13. Type "Summer Sales" and then click on the outer edge of the Chart to register the "Summer Sales" title.

14. To change the size of the chart, hold the Shift key and point to the upper left corner of the chart and when you see a diagonally pointing black arrow, click and drag outward. You should change the size to about the same size as seen in figure below:

15. To move that chart to below the Table, press and hold the Ctrl key and click on the chart (to selects it). Then click and drag your Pie chart. Then press Ctrl + F1 key to hide the Ribbons.

16. You can see that we have created an appropriate chart that shows how much each product contributed to the overall total sales. We can clearly see that the Toy products contribution the smallest amount to the overall total as compared to the other two products.

Related Topics:

Guide to Creating a Chart from Data in a Excel 2007 Worksheet
Guide to Creating and Formatting the Excel 2007 Chart Legend
Creating and Formatting the Excel 2007 Chart Title
How to Make a Histogram with Microsoft Excel 2007?

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