Animate Charts in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

In PowerPoint you can animate any slide object, but some objects have extra animation options. These objects include charts and bulleted text, and in this tutorial we will work with chart animation in PowerPoint. Since animation is largely unchanged in PowerPoint versions 2002 through 2007, we'll explore how to apply animation to charts, and also explore the various chart animation options available for versions 2007, 2003, and 2002.

So, why would you want to animate a chart? Here are some reasons:

• You might want to highlight an individual chart series or category over others, and animation lets you highlight that part of the chart.
• You want to animate the plot area separately from the rest of the chart.
• You want to animate all the columns or bars in a chart to rise up (or down, left, or right) one at a time—either automatically or sequenced.

Those were just the most common reasons why you would want to animate a chart. There are plenty of other reasons you will discover for yourself! Also remember that animation is movement, and that's something that will attract attention. For that reason, only animate charts that you want to focus on. Animating every single chart in your presentation may be taking the movement approach too far!

Follow these steps to apply animation to a chart in PowerPoint 2007 and some previous versions. For this example, we use a common column chart, but the concepts remain the same with other chart types:

1. Insert a chart on the PowerPoint slide. Learn how to insert charts in PowerPoint versions before 2007 and PowerPoint 2007.
2. Next, make sure that the Custom Animation Task Pane is visible, as shown in Figure 1, below. If this Task Pane is not visible, you won't be able to see or select any animations.
3. For PowerPoint 2007 users, make sure that the chart is still selected, then activate the Animations tab of the Ribbon. Next, click the Custom Animation button to bring up a Task Pane of the same name that you can see in Figure 1, shown later on this page. Remember, this is a toggle option: click once to show the Custom Animation Task Pane, and click again to hide it!
4. Users of earlier PowerPoint versions (PowerPoint 2002 and 2003) can again make sure that the chart is selected. Then, they should choose the Slide Show | Custom Animation option to access a similar Task Pane.
5. 
   Figure 1: Custom Animation Task Pane
3. With your chart selected, click on the edge of the chart so that it is selected, as shown in Figure 1, above. Next, click the Add Effect button in the Custom Animation Task Pane, as shown in Figure 2, below.
4. 
   Figure 2: Add Effect
4. Doing so open a fly-out menu that lets you select any of the four animation types that PowerPoint supports. For this tutorial, we chose the Entrance animation option which opens another fly-out menu, as shown in Figure 2, above.
5. Choose any of the animation styles in this fly-out menu, or choose More Effects to see more animation options. We won't go into detail about adding an animation here since we have already covered that part in our Adding an Animation in PowerPoint 2007, 2003, and 2002 tutorial. We chose the Wipe animation and selected the From Bottom direction (look ahead at Figure 3).
6. By default, PowerPoint will animate the whole chart as one object. To animate individual chart elements, right-click the animation item in the Custom Animation Task Pane and choose Effect Options from the resultant context menu, as shown in Figure 3, below.
7. 
   Figure 3: Effect Options

Animation Pane Toggle Option

The Animation Pane button is a toggle option. So, if your Animation Pane is already visible, then clicking this button will make the pane disappear. Click again to make it appear again.

7. Either way, you summons a multi-tabbed dialog box as shown in Figure 4, below. Click the Chart Animation tab, and from the Group Chart drop-down list, choose any of the options:

As One Object: Animated all at once.
By Series: All Series are animated one by one.
By Category: All categories are animated one by one.
By Element in Series: All individual series elements are animated sequentially.
By Element in Category: All individual category elements are animated sequentially.

8. 
   Figure 4: Chart Animation

All Animations are Not Equal for Charts

Cannot find all the options shown above in the Chart Animation tab? The options you see depend upon the animation effect you apply. The Wipe animation effect provides the maximum amount of options.
8. Notice the Start animation by drawing the chart background option, as shown in Figure 5, below. Chose this option to begin the animation sequence by drawing the chart background including the plot area on the slide. Click OK to apply.
9. 
   Figure 5: Start animation by drawing the chart background
9. Save your presentation.

Sample Presentation

Click below to view on YouTube