Data Visualization: Data Visualization Tools

Selecting a tool depends on many variables:

• The type of data you are working with.
• If you are new to working with data visualization tools.
• If you have coding experience.
• How much time you have to prepare your data and learn a new tool.

Before getting started with a tool, it may be helpful to sketch out your visualization idea first to determine what data you'll need, the format your data will need to be in, and which tool(s) will be the most useful.

• Quantitative data visualization tools
• Tableau
• Qualitative data visualization tools
• Network analysis tools
• Geospatial data visualization tools

• R (requires coding)
• D3.js (requires coding and familiarity with JavaScript and CSS)
  • D3.js tutorials
•  Microsoft Excel
  • If you are UW student, faculty, and staff, you will likely already have access to Microsoft Excel. Please visit UWare for more information.
• Tableau Desktop (subscription-based) or Tableau Public (free)
  • Tableau Desktop may be available to you. Please refer to the Tableau box below for more information.
• Microsoft Power BI
  • If you are UW student, faculty, or staff, you will likely already have access to Microsoft Power BI. Please visit UW IT Connect for more information.
  • Power BI tutorial
• Datawrapper Basic
  • Creates visualizations in the browser without needing to install software. Focuses on standard visualization types.
  • Datawrapper resources
• RAWGraphs
  • Creates visualizations in the browser without needing to install software. Focuses on chart types that are difficult to create with other visualization tools.
  • RAWGraphs tutorials

Tableau is a data visualization tool best suited for quantitative data. There are different versions of Tableau.

Who has access to what?

• Tableau Public: Free and open to anyone to download. New in April 2024: Data visualizations can be shared locally to your device.
• Tableau Desktop: Available for students, faculty teaching with Tableau, and some researchers. Allows user to save Tableau workbooks locally (on their personal computers). Can also share visualizations with others if they have Tableau Reader installed.
• Tableau Reader: Opens and allows users to interact with Tableau visualizations. However, users can't edit the visualizations in Tableau Reader.
• Tableau Server/Tableau Online: Allows users to save visualizations to Tableau's server (Tableau Server) or to their own server (Tableau Online). Good for large organizations with complex/many Tableau projects.

More information about Tableau at the UW

• IT Connect: Tableau
• Connect with the UW Tableau User Group

UW staff questions about Tableau

• Staff questions about Tableau access are best directed to UW-IT.
• While they do not offer technical support, the UW Tableau User Group is a great community of practice where you can learn from other students, researchers, faculty, and staff.

Tableau resources

• Getting started:
  • OneNumber, Tableau for Beginners
  • Tableau Essential Training on LinkedIn Learning (formerly Lynda) courses
    • LinkedIn Learning access provided through UW
  • Tableau Training Videos (requires a Tableau account)
  • Financial Times "Visual Vocabulary: Tableau Edition"
• Accessibility
  • Authoring for Accessibility – Tableau
  • Tableau VPATs
• Additional resources
  • OneNumber blog
  • Tableau Gallery
  • Tableau Community Forums
  • Tableau Reference Guide

• Qualitative Chart Chooser
  • Use this resource to help select a visualization for qualitative data.
• Voyant Tools (free, useful if you are interested in a variety of text analysis functions)
  • Voyant Tools guide
• NVivo (subscription-based)
• ATLAS.ti (subscription-based)
• Microsoft Word
  • If you are UW student, faculty, and staff, you will likely already have access to Microsoft Word. Please visit UWare for more information.

• Gephi (free, open source)
  • Gephi tutorials
• Cytoscape (free, open source)
  • Cytoscape tutorials
• VOSViewer (free, useful for bibliometrics)
  • VOSViewer tutorials
• R (free, open source, requires coding)
• Python (free, open source, requires coding)

• ArcGIS
  • Please refer to the GIS Resources at UW Guide for more information. You can also visit the Suzzallo Library GIS Lab if you are a student, faculty, or staff member of the University of Washington.
• Google My Maps
  • For more information, please refer to the Google My Maps information page.
• Tableau
  • Tableau Desktop may be available to you. Please refer to the Tableau box above for more information.