Tableau for Everyone: A Complete Guide to Data Visualization

Install the Tableau Desktop professional edition via a 14-day free trial, explore live or extract connections with more than 70 connectors, and compare with Tableau Public.

Understand live and extract connections in Tableau, learn how refreshing a live data source updates data, and how extracts create a static hyper file for offline analysis.

Tableau's live connections query the data source for real-time updates and may incur latency; extracts use a local offline copy and refresh manually, with credentials not required.

Publish Tableau workbooks to Tableau Public or Tableau Online from Desktop. Learn the difference between twbx (packaged with data) and twb (data source only) and how Tableau Reader opens twbx.

Explore how to connect an Excel data source to Tableau Public, identify dimensions and measures, and understand how Tableau interprets numeric versus non-numeric fields.

update data types in Tableau by assigning string, boolean, geographic, or numeric types, handling non-convertible values as null, and rename fields locally without changing the source.

Explore how discrete and continuous fields shape visualizations, with blue for discrete labels and green for continuous axes, and how to switch between dimensions and measures, including aggregation and granularity.

Explore aggregation and granularity in Tableau by switching between sum and average and using dimensions to set chart granularity, including min, max, count, count distinct, and attribute.

Explore discrete date parts vs continuous date values in Tableau, switching between month and quarter views to visualize sales over time with continuous and discrete time axes.

Learn to create calculated fields in Tableau, combine customer id and name, and apply string and date calculations using functions like lower and split.

Learn how to use logical expressions and if statements in Tableau calculated fields to test conditions, return values with then/else/end, and handle defaults or null.

Learn to build ratio calculations in Tableau by creating calculated fields for profit by sales, converting results to percentage, and understanding aggregation with totals.

Learn to create bar charts and stacked bar charts in Tableau, using measures and dimensions like category and region to compare sales, customize colors, labels, tooltips, and currency formatting.

Create line charts in Tableau to show the movement of sales over time, switching between discrete and continuous time scales and styling with color and marks.

Create a Tableau line chart showing profit against debt by month, then build dynamic labels with a calculated field and color them red to highlight key values.

Learn how to sort data in Tableau with computed and manual sorts, including region and category sorting and sorting by sum of sales or profit.

Learn how nested sorts in Tableau sort each region and category bin independently by its own sum of sales, versus non-nested sorts applying a single order across bins.

Master Tableau filters for dimension and measure, learning to exclude or keep only specific members, apply wildcard and condition rules, and fine tune views with top and range filters.

Learn to add reference lines to highlight averages and profits in Tableau, and create trend lines in scatterplots to reveal the relationship between two measures, plus interpret r-squared and p-values.

Create a Tableau scatterplot comparing profit ratio and sales using a calculated field, with level of detail and reference lines to reveal product and region insights.

Learn to create and use hierarchies in Tableau, organizing geographic data (country, state, city, postal code) and product details, and drill down from year to quarter to month.

Explore how cross tabs in Tableau organize sales and profit by subcategory and quarter, then elevate readability with highlight tables and color scales.

Learn how to create heat maps in Tableau by encoding profit and sales with color and size across regions and subcategories, and distinguish them from highlight tables with formatting options.

Create symbol maps in Tableau by geocoding fields, generating latitude and longitude, and visualizing state-level sales and profit with color coding and bubble sizes.

Create filled maps in Tableau to visualize state profits, color by profit, label states with profit and names, format currency in dollars, and compare simple versus filled maps.

Learn how to use context filters in Tableau to surface the top five profitable California cities by filtering data with state context, resolving ambiguous locations on a map.

Explore how histograms visualize data distribution in Tableau, using bins to group scores from 0 to 200, adjusting bin size to reveal patterns and continuous distribution.

Learn how to design and interpret pie charts to show part of whole, when to use them for few categories, and how to format labels, colors, and profit by category.

Create tree maps, a word cloud, and packed bubbles in Tableau, using sales as size and color, and subcategory plus region as details and labels.

Master interactive tooltips in Tableau to display sales details by subcategory on hover, building embedded visualizations across charts such as office supplies subcategories.

Learn to build a dual-axis, combination chart in Tableau, visualizing sales and discount (or profit), synchronize axes, and format currencies, colors, and labels for clear data visualization.

Learn to create a lollipop chart from a bar chart in Tableau by using a dual-axis trick, synchronizing axes, and formatting colors and size for visual appeal.

This lecture demonstrates adding custom shapes in Tableau by creating a calculated profit ratio kpi, assigning icons from a shapes repository, and visualizing categories by region for clear storytelling.

Explore how to enable and customize animations in Tableau, including duration, simultaneous versus sequential effects, and applying settings to specific sheets and visuals.

Discover the show me feature in Tableau to quickly create charts by selecting dimensions and measures, understanding how maps, pies, and area charts are built with the marks card.

Learn how to apply date filters in Tableau to analyze sales by order date, using relative dates, start/end constraints, and discrete versus continuous options for year, quarter, month.

learn to create and manage groups in Tableau by combining dimension members into a new dimension, using data-driven or visual groups for ad hoc analysis with renaming and color coding.

Create and compare sets in Tableau, including top 10 by sales and by profit. Build a combined set, explore dynamic vs fixed sets, and visualize with in-out membership.

Create and apply parameters in Tableau to let users switch top N by sales or profit, and choose metrics like sum, profit, or average profit via a barometer.

Build a profit dashboard by creating a line chart of profit over time with continuous month, a state map of profit, and the top 10 profitable products, with consistent formatting.

Learn to build profit analysis dashboards in Tableau, including profit over time with continuous month, profit by state, and top 10 profitable products, with trend lines and polished formatting.

Practice building sales dashboards in Tableau by creating a line chart of sales over time, a region map chart, and a top 10 products list, duplicating charts with header changes.

Develop dashboard skills in tableau by duplicating sheets, renaming views such as sales over time and sales by state, and sorting top products to analyze sales and profits.

Learn to create and customize dashboards in Tableau, using device previews, size options, and your six sheets. Explore containers, floating vs fixed objects, and components like text and image.

Create a profit analysis dashboard in Tableau by combining views from multiple data sources, configuring profit over time, top 5 products, and region maps with formatting and currency settings.

Learn to build interactive Tableau dashboards by adding actions that connect source and target sheets, apply context filters, and use floating elements to show top five profitable products by state.

Create a sales analysis dashboard with horizontal and vertical containers, a generic desktop canvas, two views, and region and order date filters, distributing space evenly.

Demonstrate interactive dashboard actions by finalizing the sales analysis dashboard, updating filters to dropdowns, aligning the map background, and creating a product list sheet linked to details.

Build a sales analysis dashboard in Tableau by setting year and region filters, configuring maps and product charts, and adding actions to navigate to top five products and related sheets.

Learn to use dashboard navigation objects in Tableau, place floating navigation buttons, link dashboards like sales analysis and profit analytics, and enable downloading the dashboard as a video.

Build a course comparison dashboard in Tableau that embeds YouTube demos for six courses, using a dataset with name, launch, cost, and watch URL.

Create a Tableau story from the profit and sales analysis dashboard, configure story points for regional profits, and present insights in sequential, story-based slides.

Format a Tableau story by duplicating dashboards, configuring story points for profit analysis, and applying per-story formatting and captions to present regional and overall insights.

Learn to create custom dates in tableau to visualize data by year, quarter, or month, using the order date field and calculated date fields to build hierarchies.

Learn table calculations in Tableau, including scope and direction across or down the view, to compute last-quarter differences, percent of total, and ranking of subclass in the global superstore dataset.

Explore Tableau table calculations on crosstabs and bar charts, including running totals, percent of total, differences, and rank, with granularity by order date and grand totals.

Discover how table calculations vary by scope and direction through compute using options (table across, table down, pin, running total) to produce percent totals and grand totals.

Learn to use Tableau table calculations to compute a rank-based profit across classes and subclasses, creating a rank-driven visualization that shows the most profitable surplus in a budget format.

Apply table calculations to show percent of total by class and subclass across years, using a gain or loss calculated field to classify profit and loss, and publish.

Explore level of detail (LOD) expressions and how they control data granularity in Tableau. Learn to render totals independent of current dimensions and compute stable percent-of-total values.

Explore fixed level of detail expressions in Tableau to compute each subcategory's percent of total category sales, using calculated fields like category sales and percent of contribution.

Explore cohort analysis with fixed LOD and fixed expression in Tableau to measure customer retention by minimum or first order date across regions, using percent of total.

Explore level of detail in Tableau by using include expressions to add dimensions like region and category, switch aggregations to average, and verify results with cross tables and calculated fields.

Explore how exclude level of detail expressions compute totals by omitting a dimension, using calculated fields to reveal furniture category sales across regions.

Learn to apply an excludable expression to establish a 2016 profit benchmark, compute the 2016 value across years, and calculate the percentage difference from that benchmark.

Apply Babloo level of detail expression in hands-on exercise. Use 2016 as the benchmark, compute percentage differences for 2006–2009, and update headers with text alert and barometer in Tableau.

Create a sheet with a 2016 benchmark for sales, a percent difference field, and a year parameter to update the benchmark, barometer, and header dynamically.

Learn the Tableau data model with a logical layer of tables and a physical layer from data sources. See how relationships differ from joins and how to configure performance options.

Understand how to join two tables in Tableau using common columns like region and country, applying inner, left, right, and full outer joins, including multi-column joins and null handling.

Learn to use relationships instead of joins in Tableau to combine sales and finance data without data loss, leveraging common columns like region and country for flexible visualizations.

Explore cross-database joins in Tableau using multiple Excel data sources, apply join calculations and string splitting to identify students who checked out books and how many.

Explore relationships with calculations in Tableau for everyone, using cross-database joins and relationship calculations to filter nulls and zero counts.

Learn how data blending in Tableau handles differing granularity by aggregating first and then blending, using separate data connections and a left outer join.

Learn how to use relationships instead of blending to integrate sales and finance data with a different level of detail, exclude nulls, and manage aggregation at the data source level.

Explore how Tableau handles relationships, joins, and blends, detailing when to use datasource-level joins, matching fields, and the trade-offs of inner, left, and right joins for cross-table data visualization.

Learn how to create unions in Tableau, combine multiple tables, handle mismatched and shared columns, and manage resulting fields such as sheet and table names for unified visualizations.