How to Change Increments on Google Sheets Graph

A perfectly good set of data can be let down by poor presentation, and one of the most common culprits is a cluttered or confusing chart axis. When Google Sheets chooses automatic increments for your graph, the numbers can look odd or distracting, making your insights harder to communicate. Fortunately, you have full control to fix this.

This tutorial will walk you through exactly how to change the increments on any Google Sheets graph. We’ll cover how to customize both the vertical (value) and horizontal (category) axes to make your charts clean, professional, and easy to read.

Why Should You Change Graph Increments?

Before diving into the "how," it's helpful to understand the "why." While the default Google Sheets settings are often good enough, manually setting your axis increments offers several key advantages that can transform a confusing chart into a clear and compelling one.

• Improves Readability: The most significant benefit is clarity. An axis cluttered with too many numbers (e.g., 0, 1.3, 2.6, 3.9) is hard to scan. Changing the increment to a clean, round number (e.g., 0, 2, 4, 6) makes the chart instantly more professional and easier for your audience to understand at a glance.

• Highlights Specific Trends: By adjusting the minimum and maximum values of your axis, you can effectively "zoom in" on a specific range of data. This is great for highlighting subtle but important fluctuations that might get lost in a chart that starts at zero.

• Provides Context: Manually setting an axis range provides crucial context. For example, if you're tracking a key performance indicator (KPI) with a goal of 100, setting the maximum value of your axis to 100 or 120 can visually show progress toward that goal, which is something an auto-scaled axis might miss.

• Standardizes Reporting: When creating a series of charts for a report or dashboard, you want them to be visually consistent. Manually setting the same axis increments and ranges across multiple charts ensures that they're all directly comparable, creating a more cohesive and professional-looking document.

The Basics: Creating a Chart in Google Sheets

If you're already comfortable creating charts, feel free to skip to the next section. For anyone who needs a quick refresher, here's how to generate a basic chart in Google Sheets.

First, organize your data into columns. For most charts, you'll want one column for your labels (the X-axis, like dates or categories) and another for your values (the Y-axis, like sales or website traffic).

Here’s a sample dataset we can use:

1. Select all the data, including the headers (from "Month" to "$16,200").

2. Go to the top menu and click Insert > Chart.

3. Google Sheets will automatically create a chart based on its best guess (often a line or column chart) and open the Chart editor on the right side of your screen.

With a chart on your sheet, you’re ready to start customizing the axes.

Step-by-Step: Changing Vertical Axis (Y-Axis) Increments

The vertical axis, or Y-axis, is the one you’ll customize most often. This axis represents your numerical values, and controlling its increments, or "step," is the key to creating a clean chart.

Let's use our sample revenue data. By default, Google Sheets might create an axis with steps every $2,000, but perhaps you want to see increments of $5,000 for a broader view. Here’s how to do it.

1. Double-click anywhere on your chart to open the Chart editor panel on the right.

2. In the editor, click on the Customize tab at the top.

3. Click on the Vertical axis section to expand its options. If you have a chart with multiple axes, make sure you've selected the correct one.

4. Scroll down until you see the settings for Min and Max, as well as the Gridlines and ticks sub-section. This is where you'll make the key changes.

5. Enter your desired minimum and maximum values. For our revenue chart, we could set a Min of 5000 and a Max of 20000 to give our data some breathing room.

6. Under Gridlines and ticks, find the field labeled Major step. This field controls the distance between each labeled gridline on your axis.

7. Enter your desired increment. To show labels every $5,000, simply type 5000 into the Major step box.

Instantly, your chart’s Y-axis will update. Instead of potentially awkward default values, it will now display clean, easy-to-read increments of $5,000, $10,000, $15,000, and $20,000. This small tweak makes the chart look much more intentional and professional.

Pro Tip: Combine Min/Max Values with the Major Step

The Major step works best when you also define the Min and Max values for your axis. By setting this range yourself, you prevent Google Sheets from automatically resizing the chart in a way that creates awkward steps. For example, setting our range from 5000 to 20000 with a step of 5000 ensures the axis labels are exactly what we want them to be.

How to Change Horizontal Axis (X-Axis) Increments for Dates

Adjusting the horizontal axis, or X-axis, is most useful when you're working with time-series data, like daily traffic or weekly sales over a long period. When you have a lot of data points, the X-axis can become a crowded, unreadable mess of dates. You can clean this up using the same principles.

Imagine you have daily sales data for the last three months. Plotting all 90 days would make the X-axis illegible.

Here’s how to show an increment for every 14 days (or every two weeks) instead:

1. Double-click the chart to open the Chart editor.

2. Navigate to the Customize tab and expand the Horizontal axis section.

3. Scroll down to the Gridlines and ticks area.

4. Just like with the vertical axis, find the Major step field. For dates, the number you enter corresponds to days. To show a label every two weeks, enter 14. To show one every week, you would enter 7.

Your X-axis will immediately update, showing a date label only once every 14 days. This declutters the view and makes the chart's overall trend much easier to follow.

What About Minor Ticks?

Below the Major step field, you'll also see an option for Minor tick count or Minor step. What's the difference?

• Major Ticks/Steps: These are the primary division lines on your axis that get a numerical label (e.g., 0, 10, 20, 30).

• Minor Ticks: These are smaller, unlabeled tick marks that appear between your major ticks for added granularity. They help users pinpoint values more precisely without cluttering the axis with extra numbers.

For example, if your Major step is 100, you could set the Minor tick count to 3. This would place three small lines between 0 and 100, effectively marking 25, 50, and 75. It's a great feature for technical or scientific charts where precision is important.

Common Issues and Troubleshooting Tips

Sometimes things don't go as planned. Here are a few common issues and how to quickly resolve them.

My numbers are being treated as text, and I can't change the increments.

This happens if Google Sheets misinterprets your numerical data as text. The customization options for a text-based axis are much more limited. To fix this, select the column of data, go to the top menu, and click Format > Number > Number (or Currency, Percentage, etc.). Your chart should update instantly, and the full range of axis customization options will become available.

The "Major step" field is grayed out or missing.

Certain chart types, like a pie chart, don't have axes, so these options won't appear. This also can happen on axes with non-numeric data (text labels). If you believe your data is numeric, try the formatting fix mentioned above.

The axis looks too sparse or too dense after my changes.

Finding the right increment is often a process of trial and error. There’s no perfect rule, as it depends on your data's range and story. A good starting point is to aim for 5-10 major tick marks on your axis. If you have more, your chart can look cluttered. If you have fewer, it might lack necessary detail. Don't be afraid to try a few different Major step values until it feels right.

Final Thoughts

Taking a moment to customize your axis increments is a small effort that yields major returns in clarity and professionalism. By moving beyond the defaults and taking control of your chart’s appearance through the "Customize" tab, you ensure your data story is not only accurate but also visually compelling and easy to understand.

While mastering spreadsheets is incredibly valuable, manually tweaking reports week after week can be a drain on your time, especially if you have to gather data from multiple sources first. That is precisely why we created Graphed. We connect to your marketing and sales tools - like Google Analytics, Shopify, and Salesforce - and let you ask for dashboards in plain English. Instead of manually adjusting axis increments, you can simply ask, "Show me my Shopify revenue by month this year," and get a live, interactive dashboard in seconds, allowing you to focus on the insights, not the setup.