SQL Data Visualization

SQL Data Visualization in seconds.

This article explains how to do it, and shows you a tool that can do it for you in seconds.

It can be broken down to 3 easy steps: Come up with a question or topic, extract the relevant data, and visualize the data.

• Step 1: Formulate your question
  Step 1 is to figure out what you want to visualize. Typically this will mean defining a specific topic or question, like “How many new users signed up to our website each day this week?”. This will determine what data you need to extract from your database in step 2.

"How many new users signed up to our website each day this week?"

• Step 2: Data extraction
  Step 2 is to extract the data you want to visualize. This involves running SQL code to join, manipulate, and extract data from one or more tables in your database. Once you know what you want to visualize, you can figure out what SQL code will extract the relevant data.

#How many users signed up each day this week?

SELECT DATE(signup_date) AS date, COUNT(*) AS new_users
FROM users
WHERE signup_date >= CURDATE() - INTERVAL 7 DAY
GROUP BY date
ORDER BY date;

• Step 3: Create the visualization
  The final step is to use the data you extracted as an input for a graph. Which graph you use depends on the data you want to graph.

  
  
  In this example, a line graph is best.
  
  If you simply have a list of numbers you want to compare for different categories, you might use a bar chart or a pie chart.
  
  If you want to see how something changes over time, a line graph is usually best.
  
  If you want to see how things change over time for different categories, you may want to use a line graph, with a line for each category.