How to animate a chart in PowerPoint

Animate a chart by series or category

1. Insert your chart (Insert > Chart) or paste one from Excel, and select it.
2. On the Animations tab, pick an entrance effect. Wipe works best for bars and columns; Fade works for anything.
3. Click Effect Options and choose a sequence: As One Object, By Series, By Category, By Element in Series or By Element in Category.
4. For column charts set the Wipe direction to From Bottom; for bar charts, From Left.
5. Set Start (On Click or After Previous) and Duration in the Timing group, then preview.

Export the animation as a video

1. Go to File > Export > Create a Video.
2. Choose a quality and the seconds spent on each slide.
3. Click Create Video and save the MP4.

What PowerPoint can't do

PowerPoint's chart animations reveal a chart in pieces; they never change the data. So it can't:

• Animate values changing over time: bars can appear, but they can't grow from 2010 to 2020 values or swap places.
• Rank and re-sort items as a race.
• Draw a line progressively with a moving date label.

The workaround: insert a video

1. Make the chart in MakeYourChart from the same data and export a 16:9 MP4.
2. In PowerPoint, choose Insert > Video > This Device and pick the file.
3. On the Playback tab, set Start to Automatically so the chart animates when the slide appears.