Adjusting scales on axes

By default, there is only one scale on an axis, and all measures are shown on this scale. If the measures are of completely different magnitudes, or use different units, you might benefit from using other options, for example, adding more than one scale on an axis to visualize the measures.

About this task

To give an example, imagine a bar chart containing two bars, each of the bars representing a certain column. One bar represents the total precipitation during a month, and another bar the average temperature. These two measures probably differ a lot, and might need two scales on the value axis.

You might encounter some of the following scale options in the various visualization types.

Single scale
The Single scale option means that the scale is common to all the measures on the axis. It is the default scale setting.

For example, on the value axis below, there is only one scale, shared by both the measures, Sum(Electronics) and Sum(Toys).
Dual scales
When you use the Dual scales option, there is one scale to the left and one scale to the right on the Value axis/Y-axis. Each of the scales can be shared by more than one measure.

In the example below, the value axis has two scales, one to the left and one to the right. Two columns share the left scale, and to the right, another scale is used for the third column, because the unit is different and the values are of totally different magnitudes.

This option is available in bar charts, line charts, combination charts, and scatter plots.
One scale for each color
Another option to show more than one scale is One scale for each color. If you use this option, you get one scale for each color that is defined on the color axis. This means that no scales are shared.

An example of a value axis with three scales is shown below. The scales are differentiated by their colored scale labels.

This option is available in bar charts, line charts, combination charts, and scatter plots.
One scale for each trellis panel
For trellised visualizations, it is possible to show one scale per trellis panel.

For example, the line chart below shows the maximum temperature measured per year at a certain location, and it is trellised per season. The scales in the different trellis panels are adapted to the seasonal temperatures.

This option is available in bar charts, line charts, combination charts, waterfall charts, scatter plots, and box plots.
One scale for each line
Moreover, in a line chart you have the option to show the lines normalized, so that all lines are drawn on a scale with the maximum value for each line set to 100%, and the minimum value for each line set to 0%.

In the example below, the normalized lines are used for visualizing sales patterns.

Procedure

In the Visualization properties, locate the axis section of interest (for example, the Y-axis, the Value axis, or the Columns axis).
Select the scale option of interest (Single scale, Dual scale, etc.). Note that the names of the options is slightly different depending on from where you access the properties, and that not all options are available in all visualizations.
Determine whether to show the scale To the left or To the right.
Decide whether to Show labels at all, and whether to show them Horizontally or Vertically, and if desired, provide a Max number of labels.
Limiting the number of labels can improve readability on axis scales with many values.
In some cases, it might also be applicable to use a Reverse scale, use a Log scale, Edit scale range, change the label rendering or the formatting of the values.
Log scale is available for continuous axes only. It changes the scale from a linear scale to a logarithmic base 10 scale [log10 (x)].

Reverse scale reverses the current sort order, so that the lowest value is shown at the top of the scale.

In the scale range settings, you can determine a lower and upper value of the axis range, or leave the Min and Max fields blank to automatically adjust the range to the currently lowest or highest value in the filtered data.
Set to current range allows you to set the axis range to the currently filtered values.

Include origin is available for continuous axes only. It allows you to always includes the value 0 on the axis, regardless of filtering.

Results

The visualization is updated.

Tip: Many of the scale and axis settings are also available by clicking or right-clicking directly on an axis in the visualization.

Tip: In the axis sections of the visualization properties, you can also change the axis mode from continuous to categorical (when applicable), and change the axis expression evaluation. See Axis settings for more information.