Introduction
Excel is a powerful tool for storing data and making graphs. In this lesson, you will learn one way to make a scatter plot in Excel. A scatter plot is a graph that plots the data points, but it doesn’t connect them with a line.
This video illustrates the lesson material below. Watching the video is optional.
Scatter Plot Basics
Scatter plots are pretty simple to make. Here are the basic steps for creating a scatter plot in Excel:
First, input the data into Excel. In column A, list the years, and in column B, list the church population in millions. In other words, each number in the column multiplied by a million will give you the total number of members in that year. This information will be used to create a scatter plot. The following steps are illustrated in Figure 1:
- Highlight the data including the heading of both columns you would like to plot.
- Select the Insert tab. This can be found in the top-left corner of the program.
- Find the Charts section.
- Select the scatter plot icon. It looks like a graph with a bunch of scattered dots.
- Edit axis range, axis title, chart title, and anything else you would like to adjust.
Figure 1
Figure 2
Scatter Plot Settings
There are many ways to edit a scatter plot. Look at the example below to determine what changes you can and want to make.
Notice that the visual is set up so the x-axis displays the years, separated in 20-year increments. The y-axis displays the population by millions, separated in 2-million increments. The graph has also been automatically titled: “Church Population in Millions.”
To edit the scatter plot’s title, select the title, which automatically makes the information editable. You can change the title to whatever you think best suits the scatter plot information.
Figure 3
Take a closer look at the axes. While they have been set up to match the data, they do not have labels. This makes the graph somewhat unclear for anyone trying to read the information. Follow the steps below to add axis titles:
- Select the graph by double-clicking on it.
- Select Add Chart Element, which is found at the top-left or top-right side of the page.
- Under Add Chart Element, select Axis Titles. The primary horizontal title refers to the x-axis, and the primary vertical title refers to the y-axis. Titles can be added to both axes.
- The default axis title will read, “Axis Title.” To change this, select the title and type a label which represents the information in that axis.
Figure 4
You can edit the tick marks on the graph by double-clicking on a number, which opens a pop-up window with the tick mark settings. Try starting with the x-axis tick marks. The marks are separated by 20 years. In this example, it makes more sense to separate the data by 10 years, since the data has been gathered every 10 years. Follow these steps to do so:
- Double-click on the years on the x-axis.
- In the Format Axis panel, change the major units to 10.
Figure 5
Notice that the scatter plot begins in 1900, but the data begins in 1907. In the Format Axis panel, you might consider changing the minimum bound from 1900 to 1907.
Figure 6
Things to Remember
- To make a scatter plot in Excel, highlight the data you want to graph, select Insert, and select the scatter plot icon.
- To edit the graph, select the Add Chart Element option in the upper ribbon, or double-click items within the graph that you would like to edit.
Practice Problems
The following table summarizes data on the number of hours that students spent studying and the scores that they earned on their exams.
Hours Studied | Exam Score |
---|---|
7.5 | 68 |
9.5 | 92 |
6.75 | 79 |
1.75 | 36 |
6 | 72 |
9 | 95 |
7.5 | 86 |
7 | 95 |
8.5 | 73 |
0.75 | 48 |
Need More Help?
- Study other Math Lessons in the Resource Center.
- Visit the Online Tutoring Resources in the Resource Center.
- Contact your Instructor.
- If you still need help, Schedule a Tutor.