Bars oriented horizontally, ideal when category labels are long or when showing rankings. The horizontal layout provides more room for text labels and naturally reads like a leaderboard from top to bottom.
How Far Is Each Planet from the Sun? (million km)
Best for
- Displaying rankings or ordered lists
- Comparing categories with long text labels
- Showing survey results or frequency distributions
Avoid when
- Data has a natural time progression — use a column or line chart
- You need to show composition — use a stacked bar
- There are very few categories that fit fine as vertical columns