Create a PivotTable

Learn what a PivotTable and PivotCharts are, and how you can use them to summarize and analyze data in Excel 2013.

Create a PivotTable to analyze worksheet data

Being able to analyze all the data in your worksheet can help you make better business decisions. But sometimes it is hard to know where to start, especially when you have a lot of data.

Excel can help you by recommending, and then, automatically creating PivotTables, which are a great way to summarize, analyze, explore, and present your data.

1. Make sure your data has column headings or table headers, and that there are no blank rows.

2. Click any cell in the range of cells or table.

3. Click INSERT > Recommended PivotTables.

4. In the Recommended PivotTables dialog box, click any PivotTable layout to get a preview, and then pick the one that shows the data the way you want, and click OK.

Create a PivotChart

A PivotChart can help you make sense of PivotTable data. While a PivotChart shows data series, categories, and chart axes the same way a standard chart does, it also gives you interactive filtering controls right on the chart, so you can quickly analyze a subset of your data.

1. Click anywhere in the data.

2. On the INSERT tab, in the Charts group, pick Recommended Charts.

3. On the Recommended Charts tab, pick any chart with the PivotChart icon in the top corner. A preview of your PivotChart appears in the preview pane.

4. Once you find the PivotChart you like, click OK. If you don’t find a PivotChart you like, click PivotChart on the INSERT tab, instead of Recommended Charts.

5. In the PivotChart, click any interactive control, and then pick the sort or filtering options you want.

Want more?

Create a PivotTable to analyze external data

Create a PivotTable to analyze data in multiple tables

Show different calculations in PivotTable value fields

Create a PivotChart

Available chart types