Adding a horizontal Average Line to a Chart or Graph
This post explains how to add a horizontal average line to an existing Excel chart or graph in excel. How do I add a horizontal average line to a chart or graph gives loads of context for the viewer. How to use Excel VBA Macro to add a horizontal average line to the existing chart in Excel.
For example, you have a simple Excel spreadsheet tracking product sales. And you have a column with dates and another with sales. And you have made a simple chart with both columns as data sources. And you want to add a horizontal average line to this chart so that the user can see how close they are to their average sales. You can follow this guide to achieve the result.
Adding a horizontal Average Line to a Chart or Graph
To add a horizontal average line to a chart, just do the following steps:
#1 create a new average line column that contains average sales data. And type the following formula into the first cell of average column. =AVERAGE(B2:D2), then drag the AutoFill Handle over to the average columns.
#2 Right-click on the existing chart, and choose Select Data… from the drop-down menu list.
#3 the Select Data source window will appear.
#4 click Add button under Legend Entries section, the Edit Series window will appear.
#5 enter one Series name such as: Average line into the Series name text box. Then select average line column as its series values. Then click OK button.
#6 you will see that the average line has been added into the cart.
#7 Right-click on the newly average line series, and select Change Series Chart Type from the drop down menu list. The Change Chart Type window will appear.
#8 Select chart type as line for the average line series.
So far, the horizontal average line is added into the existing chart.
Adding a horizontal Average Line to a Chart or Graph with VBA
You can also write an Excel VBA Macro to add a horizontal average line to an excel chart, just do the following steps:
#1 click on “Visual Basic” command under DEVELOPER Tab.
#2 then the “Visual Basic Editor” window will appear.
#3 click “Insert” ->”Module” to create a new module.
#4 paste the below VBA code into the code window. Then clicking “Save” button.
Sub AddAverageLineChart() Dim S As Series Dim A As Variant Dim T As Double Dim O As Variant If VBA.TypeName(Application.Selection) <> "Series" Then Exit Sub Set S = Application.Selection A = S.Values T = Application.WorksheetFunction.Average(A) ReDim O(LBound(A) To UBound(A)) For i = LBound(O) To UBound(O) O(i) = T Next With ActiveChart.SeriesCollection.NewSeries .XValues = S.XValues .Values = O .Name = "Average line" & S.Name .AxisGroup = S.AxisGroup .MarkerStyle = xlNone .Border.Color = S.Border.Color .ChartType = xlLine .Format.Line.ForeColor.ObjectThemeColor = msoThemeColorAccent6 End With End Sub
#5 select all data of columns in your chart.
#6 back to the current worksheet, then run the above excel macro. Click Run button.
#7 Let’s see the result.
Related Functions
- Excel AVERAGE function
The Excel AVERAGE function returns the average of the numbers that you provided.The syntax of the AVERAGE function is as below:=AVERAGE (number1,[number2],…)….