Creating an Area chart
In a very simplistic way, an Area chart is a stacked line chart. It is an essentially a line chart where the space between each line and the next line is filled with a color. These charts are typically used to show the relative proportions of totals or percentage relationships. This type of chart is not the best way to show specific values along the line, but it can clearly show the total values so you can get an idea of how a dimension contributes to an overall trend.
Getting ready
The Area chart is an extension of the Line Chart and hence we will work on the line chart that we created earlier. In the Line chart recipe, we showed the profit for every month over the last four years. For the Area Chart, we will show the sales for every month over the last four years. Let's see how this is done.
How to do it…
While on the Line chart sheet, let us right-click on the sheet name and select the Duplicate sheet option. We will get a new sheet; rename it to Area chart.
We will...
