What to Consider When Creating a Data Visualization Style Guide
Style guides take many shapes and sizes, but here is a generic checklist you can use as a starting point for your own guide. Most guides start small with only a handful of resources and grow over time with the needs of the organization.
- Introduction
- Principles
- Explore vs Explain
- Accessible
- Equitable
- Brand voice
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- Foundation
- Color
- Categorical
- Sequential
- Diverging
- Other
- Color alternatives
- Shape
- Patterns and textures
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- Typography
- Size and dimensions
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- Responsiveness
- Medium
- Print
- Web
- Static vs interactive
- Mouse, touch, and keyboard
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- VR / AR
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- Content
- Voice and tone
- Grammar and mechanics
- Language and inclusivity
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- Visualization Parts
- Title
- Axis
- X (horizontal)
- Y (vertical)
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- Legend
- Color
- Size
- Shape
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- Marks
- Line
- Point
- Shape
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- Annotation
- Labels
- Footer
- Data sources
- Notes
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- Visualizations
- Line chart
- Bar chart
- Donut chart
- Scatterplot
- Histogram
- Etc.
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