Build a diverging bar chart
Show agree and disagree answers pulling left and right from a neutral center, one bar per question or category.
A diverging bar chart shows how answers split around a midpoint. Negative answers, like Disagree, extend left of a center line and positive ones, like Agree, extend right, so you can see at a glance which questions lean favorable. It's built for survey results, but it works for any positive-versus-negative comparison. Pick Diverging Bar from the chart type selector - it sits with the horizontal bar charts.
Fill the shelves
| Shelf | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Category | The questions or categories, one bar each. You can add a second field, like a question group alongside its wording. |
| Values | The measures that make up each bar, such as one count per answer. |
| Split By | Optional. A dimension whose members become the left and right segments. |
| Trellis | Optional. Repeats the chart once per member, such as one panel per segment. |
| Tooltip | Optional. Extra fields to show on hover. |
- Pick Diverging Bar from the chart type selector.
- Drag your question or category field to Category.
- Drag your answer measures to Values, or drag one measure to Values and the answer field to Split By.
- Open the format pane and pick a Color preset.
100% diverging bars
A 100% diverging bar draws each row as shares of its own total, on a fixed -100% to 100% axis. Questions answered by different numbers of people then compare directly, and every trellis panel puts its center in the same place. Survey battery cards on a survey dashboard draw this way. There's no switch for it in the format pane; a chart you build yourself draws raw values.
Format a diverging bar chart
Open the format pane and find Diverging bar options.
- Color preset picks Default colors, Sentiment (negative/neutral/positive) or Custom colors. Custom colors lets you set each series color.
- Label content picks what each segment's label shows when data labels are on: Percentage, Raw value, or Value & percentage.
- Tooltip values picks Value only, Percentage only, or Value & percentage.
- Show center line draws the line at the midpoint.
- Hide neutral drops neutral answers from the bars.
- Combine scale variants folds different wordings of the same answer strength into one series, named Strongly negative through Strongly positive. It's on by default and only acts when your questions really mix wordings.
- Show favorable % and Show unfavorable % add summary columns beside the bars. Favorable % header labels that column.
- Sort order sorts by Data order, By total, By net sentiment or By % favorable, ascending or descending.
Build one from the chat
Ask the Analyst pane, or a dashboard's Storyteller pane, for a diverging bar, for example "show agreement by question as a diverging bar", and it builds the chart for you. It works the same way in Analyze and on dashboards.