7 Excel Dashboard Design Principles That Make Data Beautiful

Excel’s Dashboards are efficient for creating reports, summarizing data, and analyzing performance. A dashboard must be both functional and visually appealing, which helps to get insights quickly. An organized dynamic dashboard ensures clarity that helps with decision-making. In this article, we will explore 7 Excel dashboard design principles that make data beautiful.

1. Understand Your Audience and Purpose

Before creating any dashboard, you must know your audience and the purpose of the dashboard. Based on user level you can design the dashboard in such a way that will make the dashboard useful for everyone.

For instance, executives may prefer high-level summaries, while analysts might need detailed trends. You can keep both options and provide individual sections for each type of user.

• List your audience and their requirements.
• Highlight KPIs that matter most to the audience.

2. Define Your Goals & Pick the Dashboard Type

Always try to define the goal to pick the right dashboard. It’s important to have a clear mind in mind while creating a dashboard. This will work as a skeleton of the template.

• Set Your Goal: A clear and defined goal helps to identify the most relevant key points, and metrics to showcase that will minimize the information overload.
• Choose the Right Dashboard Type: Once a goal is determined you can select the dashboard that is best suited to your needs.
  • Operational: You can use an operational dashboard to monitor real-time performance metrics like website traffic, daily sales, etc.
  • Analytical: To analyze trends, patterns, and performance over time you can use this dashboard.
  • Strategic: If you want to focus on high-level KPIs to measure progress toward long-term goals you can pick this dashboard.

3. Identify Your Key Metrics

It is the most important task to identify key metrics while creating a dashboard. Because the audience may want so many things to cover every data point. But always guide users to focus on only the key metrics on the dashboard; it will make the dashboard more user-friendly.

• Prioritize the important metrics that drive behaviors, refine strategies, and measure success.
• Show the summary of the KPI metrics instead of including minor summaries.
• You can use the 80/20 rule so that you can focus on the 20% of metrics that deliver 80% of the value.

2. Select the Right Charts

Selecting the right chart is one of the core design principles. Different datasets carry different stories, which is why you must choose a chart that represents your data story properly. The wrong chart can misrepresent data or make it harder to interpret.

Comparative Data:

• Bar charts for comparing categories.
• Scatter plots for correlation analysis.
• Bullet charts for actual vs. target comparisons.

Time Series Data:

• Line charts are best for trends over time.
• Area charts for cumulative totals.
• Column charts for periodic comparisons.

Compositional Data:

• Pie charts (only for 2-6 segments).
• Stacked bar charts for part-to-whole relationships.
• Treemap for hierarchical data.

Avoid 3D charts, they can distort data representation. Don’t overcrowd the dashboard with complex chart types. Basic charts are easy to understand at a glance. Simpler is often better.

5. Use Colors Strategically

Though it seems simple, choosing the right colors for the dashboard design is crucial. Color emphasizes key points which helps to get a deeper insight quickly. While using any color, stick to a consistent color scheme. Avoid using more than 3-4 main colors.

Color is a powerful tool for communication. You can follow the following color principles:

Strategic Base Colors:

• Choose a neutral background such as light grays or white.
• Try to use 2-3 primary colors that align with your brand and dashboard type.
• Use bright colors to highlight important data points.

Color Psychology:

• Red for negative trends, loss, or alerts.
• Green for positive performance.
• Blue for neutral information or corporate data.
• Yellow/Orange for warnings or items needing attention.

Consider Color Blindness:

• Avoid red-green combinations.
• Use patterns or icons alongside colors.
• Test your dashboard in a grayscale to ensure it remains readable.

6. Make It Interactive

Excel is more advanced now; it offers dynamic formulas and features. You can create an interactive dashboard that allows users to explore data dynamically. An interactive dashboard requires fewer manual steps, and it updates data automatically when any changes occur.

Modern Excel dashboards should be interactive to allow users to explore data meaningfully:

Dynamic Features:

• Add slicers to filter data.
• Add timeline controls for date ranges.
• Use dynamic drop-down lists for parameter selection.
• Apply conditional formatting to highlight trends automatically.
• Create drill-down capabilities with hyperlinks.

Best Practices for Interactivity:

• Place interactive controls at the top or left of the dashboard.
• Keep the required place to ensure filtered states are visible.
• Provide reset options for all interactive elements.
• Use help text, comments, notes, or tooltips for complex controls.

7. Try to Maintain a Hierarchy

Always try to maintain the hierarchy in the dashboard. It will help you to navigate through the dashboard naturally. Try to follow the usual UX design principles. The human eye typically moves from larger to smaller elements and from top-left to bottom-right in Western cultures. This will help users to navigate their dashboard naturally and understand information in order of importance.

• Place the most important metrics in the top-left quadrant.
• Always put drop-down or selective fields on the left side.
• Create clear sections with consistent spacing and alignment.
• Use clear, legible fonts like Arial or Calibri.
• Align text and numbers for better structure.
• Avoid excessive text and use labels and legends wisely.

Try to implement a logical flow of information using layout and white space.

Conclusion

To improve the dashboard design, try to follow these principles. These principles will help you to create interactive, dynamic, functional, and visually appealing dashboards. A well-designed dashboard represents data beautifully and makes data easier to interpret. Remember that great dashboard design is iterative. While designing a dashboard, gather feedback, observe how users interact with your dashboard, and continuously refine your design.