Naming Basics Best practice recommendations are to create a chart placing independent variables on the horizontal, x-axis and dependent variables on the vertical, y-axis.

How Excel Charts Work A chart has an x-axis range and a y-axis range to show the correlation between two different data sets. The x-axis is the horizontal category line.

Bar charts are, essentially, just horizontal Column charts and are generally used when the axis labels are exceptionally long.

If you have uneven distribution of data in your Excel chart, here is a better way to change the automatic axis settings.

How to switch Rows and Columns in Excel The Switch Row or Column feature allows the user to swap data over the axis; the data on the X-axis will move to the Y-axis.