Guides & tutorials

Practical, accurate guides to making, reading and explaining histograms and other statistics charts.

How to make a histogram in…

Histogram in ExcelBuilt-in chart, Analysis ToolPak and FREQUENCY.Histogram in Google SheetsChart editor, bucket size and outliers.Histogram on a TI-84STAT PLOT, Xscl and ZoomStat.Histogram in Desmoshistogram(), bin width, box and dot plots.Histogram in PythonMatplotlib, pandas, seaborn and NumPy.

Understanding histograms

What is a Histogram? Definition, Examples and How to Read One

Build a histogram step by step from 20 quiz scores, see how bin width changes the picture, and learn to read any shape.

Histogram vs. Bar Chart: Key Differences and When to Use Each

The one-question test for choosing, plus the tricky cases: dice rolls, age groups, rating scales and data over time.

The History of the Histogram: From Playfair and Pearson to Modern Data Science

From Playfair’s first bar charts and Pearson naming the histogram in 1891 to the long search for the best bin width.

5 Real-World Applications of Histograms (With Examples)

Factories, hospitals, finance, schools and photography: what each histogram shape reveals and the decision it leads to.