How to Remove Gridlines in Looker Studio

A clean, focused chart can make the difference between a confusing report and a clear insight. While Looker Studio (formerly Data Studio) adds gridlines to charts by default to help guide the eye, they can sometimes add unnecessary clutter. Removing them is a fast and easy way to give your dashboards a more professional, minimalist design that puts your data front and center. This tutorial will walk you through exactly how to remove gridlines from a variety of charts and how to set up your reports so new charts are clean by default.

Why Remove Gridlines in the First Place?

Before we jump into the "how," let's quickly touch on the "why." In the world of data visualization, there's a concept called the "data-ink ratio," which encourages using ink or pixels exclusively for displaying data. Anything extra, like heavy gridlines, dark borders, or unnecessary labels, can be considered "chart junk" - visual elements that don't add new information and may distract your audience.

By removing gridlines, you achieve a few key things:

• Improved Focus: The viewer’s attention goes directly to the bars, lines, or data points, not the background structure holding them. This makes it easier to spot trends, compare values, and understand the story your data is telling.
• A Cleaner, More Modern Aesthetic: Minimalist design is popular for a reason - it feels clean, professional, and confident. A report free of visual clutter is less intimidating and easier to read, especially for stakeholders who may not be data experts.
• More Professional Presentations: When you're sharing a report in a meeting or sending it to a client, a polished design matters. Removing gridlines is a simple trick that can elevate the overall quality and impression of your work.

Finding the Right Controls: Your Guide to the 'STYLE' Panel

All customization for the look and feel of a chart in Looker Studio happens in the Properties panel, which appears on the right side of your screen whenever you select an object on your report canvas. This panel is split between a SETUP tab (for data) and a STYLE tab (for aesthetics).

To access the gridline settings for any chart, you’ll follow these basic steps:

1. Click on the chart you want to edit. This will activate the Properties panel for that specific component.
2. In the panel on the right, click the STYLE tab. This is your command center for all things visual.
3. Scroll through the STYLE tab to find the section dedicated to grid formatting. The name of this section can vary slightly depending on the chart type, but it's often labeled simply as "Grid."

From here, the exact steps will depend on the chart you’re working with. Let's break it down.

How to Remove Gridlines from Common Chart Types

The core technique for "removing" visual elements in Looker Studio is often to make them transparent. This effectively makes them invisible without deleting any core functionality. Here’s how to apply that to your charts.

Bar, Column, and Combo Charts

Bar and column charts are some of the most common visualizations, and their gridlines are often the most distracting. The horizontal lines are intended to help readers align the end of a bar with the corresponding value on the y-axis, but a clean design often doesn't need them.

1. Select your bar or column chart on the report canvas.
2. Navigate to the STYLE tab in the properties panel.
3. Scroll down until you find the Grid section. You may need to expand it by clicking the small arrow next to its name.
4. You'll likely see options for both the vertical (Y) axis and horizontal (X) axis. Look for a setting called Grid Color.
5. Click the color square next to Grid Color. A color palette will pop up. In the bottom-right corner of this palette, you'll see a small box with a red line through it labeled "Transparent." Click this.
6. Do this for any axes where you want to remove the gridlines. For a lot of charts, you might only have significant gridlines on one axis. That's it! The lines will vanish immediately.

Pro-Tip: Instead of making them fully transparent, you could choose a very light gray color that blends subtly with your report's background. This gives your audience just a faint guide without being a visual distraction.

Line and Area Charts

For line and area charts, gridlines can be helpful for pinpointing the value of a specific data point. However, removing them can also make trend lines pop, which is often the main goal of this type of chart.

The process is almost identical to a bar chart:

1. Select your line or area chart to open its Properties.
2. Open the STYLE tab.
3. Find the Grid section.
4. You'll see options like Axis Color and Grid Color for each relevant axis.
5. Click the Grid Color box and select Transparent from the color palette.
6. Sometimes, Looker Studio also adds a solid "Axis Line" on the zero-baseline. If you want to remove that for a truly minimalist look, change the Axis Color a little higher up in the same section to Transparent as well.

Many designers prefer to keep light horizontal gridlines on line charts but remove the vertical ones to keep the focus on the progression over time (left to right).

Removing Borders from Tables

Tables don't use a "grid" in the same way charts do, their lines are cell borders. Getting rid of them can transform a dense, spreadsheet-like table into a much friendlier, readable format.

1. Select your table.
2. In the STYLE tab, you'll find different sections for formatting: Table Header, Table Body (often labeled as "Table Labels"), and sometimes Table Footer.
3. In the Table Header section, find the Header Background color setting. Right next to it is often the border color setting. Change this to Transparent or match your background color.
4. Now, scroll down to the Table Body styling area. Look for a setting called Cell Border Color.
5. Click the color box and choose Transparent. This will remove all the horizontal and vertical lines between your rows and columns, instantly decluttering the view.

For better readability, you might remove the vertical borders but keep very faint horizontal lines by setting the Cell Border Color to a light gray and making sure the Row Numbers or Pagination borders match if you have those enabled.

Beyond Gridlines: Hiding Axis Lines and Borders

Sometimes, even after removing the gridlines, you are still left with the solid lines of the X and Y axes themselves. If you want to create a truly "floating" chart with no bounding box, you'll need to turn these off as well.

You can find the setting for this in the STYLE panel under the sections for each axis (for example, "Left Y-Axis").

• Hide the Axis Line: Look for an "Axis Color" property and set it to transparent.
• Hide the Axis Labels: Find the "Axis Font Color" property and set it to transparent. This will hide the number labels along the axis itself. Do this with caution, as it removes important context unless the values are displayed directly on the data points.
• Remove the Chart Border: At the very top of the STYLE tab, you’ll find the 'Background and Border' section. You can set the Border Radius to 0, Opacity to 0, and Border Color/Weight to transparent/0 to remove any outline around the chart component itself.

Save Time with the Theme Editor

What if you want all charts in your report to have no gridlines by default? Constantly editing every new visualization is tedious and time-consuming. This is where the Theme and Layout panel is a huge help.

This panel controls the default design of your entire report. By changing a setting here, you define the style for any new component you add.

1. Make sure you don't have any specific chart selected. You can click on the report's background to de-select everything.
2. The Theme and Layout panel should now appear on the right side of the screen.
3. Click the Customize button under your current theme.
4. Scroll down to the Charts section. Here you will find universal styling options.
5. Look for a sub-section for Grid styles or similar. Find the Grid Color property here.
6. Set the Grid Color to Transparent.

Now, any new chart you add to this report will automatically have no gridlines. This single settings change can save you dozens of clicks and ensure your dashboard remains visually consistent as you build it out. It's an indispensable feature for anyone building multi-page reports or dashboards meant to have a cohesive, polished brand identity.

Final Thoughts

Ultimately, removing gridlines from your Looker Studio charts is a simple step with a significant impact. By dialing back the visual noise and making key elements transparent, you empower your audience to focus purely on the data's story. It's a fundamental skill that elevates your report design from functional to fantastic, helping you communicate insights more effectively.

While meticulously styling each report in Looker Studio is a valuable skill, we know that the time spent formatting could be better spent acting on the insights. That's precisely why we built Graphed. Our goal is to handle the heavy lifting for you - just connect your data sources, describe the dashboard you need in plain English, and we’ll instantly generate clean, professional, and real-time visualizations without you having to click through dozens of style settings.