Clearly label both axes of your graph, including measurement units if appropriate. all distract from the message of your graph. Grid lines, background patterns, 3-D effects, unnecessary legends, excessive tick marks, etc. Don't clutter up your graph with unnecessary junk.If you're drawing a lot of graphs, you may find it easier to use a specialized scientific graphing program. With a little more work, you can make publication-quality graphs. Many of the default conditions for Excel graphs are annoying, but with a little work, you can get it to produce graphs that are good enough for presentations and web pages. Most of these instructions also apply if you're using Calc, part of the free suite of programs, instead of Excel. Here I describe the features of clear, effective graphs, and I outline techniques for generating graphs using Excel. Introductionĭrawing graphs is an important part of analyzing your data and presenting the results of your research. It's not easy, but you can force spreadsheets to make publication-quality scientific graphs.
