How to Create a Pareto Chart in Tableau

Building a Pareto chart in Tableau lets you instantly see which handful of factors are driving the vast majority of your results. This guide will walk you through the entire process, step-by-step, from setting up your data to adding advanced features, so you can easily spot your biggest opportunities.

What is a Pareto Chart and Why Should You Use One?

Ever hear of the 80/20 rule? That's the Pareto principle in a nutshell. It suggests that, in many situations, roughly 80% of the effects come from just 20% of the causes. For a business, this might mean:

• 80% of your sales come from 20% of your products.

• 80% of customer complaints are related to 20% of your services.

• 80% of website traffic comes from 20% of your marketing channels.

A Pareto chart is a special combination of a bar chart and a line chart designed to bring this principle to life. The bars represent individual values (like sales per product), sorted in descending order. The line represents the cumulative percentage of the total. By looking at where the line crosses the 80% mark, you can quickly identify the "vital few" - the 20% of causes you should be focusing your energy on for the biggest impact.

Using a Pareto chart helps you move beyond gut feelings and focus your resources effectively. Instead of trying to fix 100 different small issues, you can identify the top 3-4 that will solve most of the problem. It’s an incredibly efficient way to prioritize tasks, investments, and problem-solving efforts.

Prepare Your Data for Tableau

The good news is that you don't need a complex dataset to create a Pareto chart. At its most basic, you need just two things:

1. A Dimension (Categorical Data): This is what you want to group your measure by. Think of it as the "causes." Examples include Product Name, Region, Marketing Channel, Complaint Type, or Reason for Return.

2. A Measure (Numerical Data): This is the value you want to quantify for each category. It represents the "effect." Examples include Sales, Profit, Number of Customer Complaints, or Website Sessions.

Imagine you run an online electronics store. Your data might look something like this in a spreadsheet:

This simple structure is perfect. Tableau can easily connect to this data from an Excel file, a Google Sheet, or a database, and you'll be ready to start building your chart.

Step-by-Step Guide: How to Create a Pareto Chart in Tableau

Let's use our electronics store example to build a Pareto chart from scratch. Once you connect your data source in Tableau, follow these steps.

1. Set Up the Initial Bar Chart

First, we need to create the basic bar chart that will serve as the foundation of our Pareto analysis.

• Drag your dimension (in our case, Product Category) from the Data pane onto the Columns shelf.

• Drag your measure (Sales) onto the Rows shelf.

You’ll now see a simple bar chart. To make it easier to read for our analysis, right-click on the Product Category pill in the Columns shelf and select Sort. In the pop-up window, choose to sort by Field, set the Sort Order to Descending, and the Field Name to Sales (or whichever measure you are using).

2. Create the Dual-Axis Chart Foundation

A Pareto chart needs both bars and a line. The easiest way to achieve this in Tableau is with a dual-axis chart.

• Drag your measure (Sales) from the Data pane onto the Rows shelf again, placing it to the right of the existing Sales pill. You'll now have two identical bar charts, one on top of the other.

• In the Marks card area, you’ll see separate cards for your two charts (likely labeled SUM(Sales) and SUM(Sales) (2)). Click on the second Marks card - the one for the bottom chart.

• In the dropdown menu on this second Marks card that currently says "Automatic", change the chart type to Line.

Now you have a bar chart and a line chart in the same view. Next, right-click the second SUM(Sales) pill on the Rows shelf and select Dual Axis. The two charts will overlay, and Tableau will add a second Y-axis on the right side of your visualization.

To keep things tidy, right-click the right-hand axis and select Synchronize Axis. This ensures both axes use the same scale, which is an important step before we add table calculations.

3. Add the First Table Calculation: Running Total

This is where the magic happens. We need to transform the line chart from showing individual sales values into a cumulative total.

• Go back to the second SUM(Sales) pill on the Rows shelf (the one you've already turned into a line). Right-click on it.

• From the context menu, select Add Table Calculation.

• In the Table Calculation dialog box, under Calculation Type, choose Running Total. This calculation adds up the value of each category cumulatively from left to right.

• Close the dialog box. You should now see your line chart climb from left to right, representing the running total of sales.

4. Add the Second Table Calculation: Percent of Total

Now we have a running total, but a Pareto chart typically shows a cumulative percentage. To get this, we need to add a secondary table calculation on top of the one we just made.

• Right-click on that same SUM(Sales) pill on the Rows shelf again.

• This time, select Edit Table Calculation.

• In the dialog box, you'll see your Running Total configuration. At the bottom, check the box that says Add secondary calculation.

• A second set of options will appear. For the Secondary Calculation Type, choose Percent of Total.

Your line chart now represents the cumulative percentage of total sales, and your right-hand axis has changed to a percentage scale from 0% to 100%. Congratulations, you have a functional Pareto chart!

Reading and Interpreting Your Pareto Chart

With your chart complete, reading it is simple. The bars, sorted from highest to lowest, show you the individual contribution of each product category. The line shows you the cumulative impact.

To find your "vital few," locate the 80% mark on the right-hand axis. Follow that line across to where it intersects with your cumulative percentage line, then look down to see which bars fall to the left of that intersection.

In our example, you'd likely see that Smartphones, Laptops, and Headphones together account for roughly 80% of total sales. All the other categories - smart watches, tablets, accessories, etc. - are the "trivial many." This tells you that any strategic effort to boost sales should heavily focus on those top three product categories, as small improvements there will have a much bigger impact than massive improvements in the smaller categories. You can also add a reference line to make this even clearer. Just right-click on the percentage axis, choose 'Add Reference Line', set the value to 0.8 (for 80%), and label it.

Advanced Tips for Your Tableau Pareto Chart

Want to take your analysis a step further? Here are a couple of ideas.

Create a Dynamic Cutoff with a Parameter

Maybe the 80/20 rule doesn't quite fit your business - perhaps it’s 90/10. You can use a parameter to let users select their own cutoff threshold dynamically.

1. Create a Parameter. Call it "Pareto Threshold". Set the data type to float, display format to percentage, and set a range from 0.0 to 1.0.

2. Create a Calculated Field. Let's call it "Color Coder". The formula would separate the vital few from the trivial many:

1. Drag this new calculated field to the Color shelf on your bar chart's Marks card. Now when you adjust the parameter, the bar colors will update to reflect which categories fall within your chosen threshold.

Polish Your Visuals

Don't forget aesthetic touches. Adjust the colors of your bars and line chart to match your brand. Edit the tooltips to provide more context when a user hovers over a data point. Clean up titles and axis labels to make the chart clear and presentable for stakeholders. For a really clean look, you can hide the right-side percentage axis now that the line's purpose is clear.

Final Thoughts

The Pareto chart is a powerful tool for prioritization, helping you focus on the factors that truly move the needle. By following these steps, you can build a clean, functional, and insightful Pareto chart directly in Tableau to guide your business decisions.

While mastering table calculations in tools like Tableau is a valuable skill, the multi-step process can be time-consuming and feel complex if you're not a data expert. We built Graphed because we believe getting these insights shouldn't require a steep learning curve. Instead of managing dual axes and secondary calculations, you can just connect your data and ask in plain English: "Show me a Pareto chart of sales by product category." We eliminate the manual busywork, giving you back time to act on the insights, not just build the visuals.