---
title: "Grouped bar"
description: "Side-by-side bars per series. What the grouped bar is for, the data it needs and every option it has."
section: "Widgets"
canonical: "https://banksync.io/docs/widgets/chart-grouped-bar"
specs: ["dashboards"]
operationBindings: [{"capability":"dashboards","operation":"dashboards.author"}]
---

Side-by-side bars per series. It sits in the **Comparison** group of the widget library.

![Example grouped bar on a BankSync dashboard](https://cdn.banksync.io/screenshots/docs/charts/grouped-bar.195f47eacff3f06b.png)

## When to use it

Use a grouped bar to compare a few measures or series side by side within each category: income versus spending per month, this year versus last year per category, or balances per account across two banks.

## When to pick something else

- Only one measure? Use a **Column chart** or **Bar chart**.
- The parts add up to a meaningful total? Use a **Stacked bar**.
- Care about each part's share, not its size? Use a **100% stacked bar**.
- Many dates? Use a **Line chart** with one line per series.

## The data it needs

Pick these in the **Data** tab of the inspector. BankSync suggests a column for each when your source has an obvious match.

| Field      | Needed   | Pick                 | Notes |
| ---------- | -------- | -------------------- | ----- |
| **X axis** | Yes      | a category or a date |       |
| **Y axis** | Yes      | a number             |       |
| **Series** | Optional | a category           |       |
| **Color**  | Optional | a category           |       |

Rows that share a category are combined before drawing: choose **Sum**, **Average**, **Count**, **Min** or **Max** on the value field. See [Binding data](/docs/widgets/binding-data).

## Grouped bar options

This chart has no options of its own; everything on its **Style** tab is the shared chart styling below.

## Shared chart styling

Every chart also has the shared styling options. These apply to this one:

- [Legend](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#legend): position, layout and which series show.
- [Axes](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#axes): titles, tick labels and number format.
- [Grid](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#grid), [title](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#title), [padding](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#padding) and [background](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#background).
- [Value labels](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#value-labels) on the marks.
- [Categories and labels](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#categories-and-labels): top N with "Other", sort order, readable labels, the handwritten callout.
- [Style](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#style): corner radius, line width, opacity and animation.
- [Tooltip](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#tooltip) on hover.
- Click to filter: clicking a mark can filter the rest of the dashboard. See [Filters and cross-filtering](/docs/dashboards/filters-and-cross-filtering).
- [Colours](/docs/widgets/chart-styling#palette): follow the dashboard palette or pick one for this chart.

## Messy data

- Without a series field it draws plain single bars.
- When bars would be too thin to read, it switches to stacked bars automatically.
- More than 8 series: the 7 largest keep their colour and the rest merge into **Other**.
- Categories that don't fit fold into one **Other (N)** group; dates never fold.
- A missing value leaves a gap in the group; negative values extend below zero.

## On a phone

Groups get cramped at phone width, so it may fall back to stacked bars when there are many categories. Keep phone versions to two or three series and a short range, such as the last six months.

## Related charts

- [Bar chart](/docs/widgets/chart-bar): Horizontal categorical bars
- [Column chart](/docs/widgets/chart-column): Vertical categorical bars
- [Stacked bar](/docs/widgets/chart-stacked-bar): Composition per category
- [100% stacked bar](/docs/widgets/chart-normalized-stacked-bar): Composition as percentage
- [Lollipop](/docs/widgets/chart-lollipop): Bars with circle endpoints
- [Dot plot](/docs/widgets/chart-dot): Discrete category dots
- [Bullet chart](/docs/widgets/chart-bullet): Single value with target bands