How To Make a Donut/Doughnut Chart in Illustrator Keeping Data Live

[@bloodwolf2609]

I got distracted working on everything after watching but I came back an hour later to give the well deserved like comment for the algorithm for the perfect tutorial.

[@davidleong256]

Illustrator a completely new thing for me, and you're a complete lifesaver. your tutorial is very clear, is easy to understand, even I'm not an English speaker.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you, David! :)

[@ericaacosta5850]

This video is short and sweet. Thank you so much for doing such a succinct job at relaying these steps.

[@LukeFlegg]

Could not have shaved a single second out of that. Masterpiece

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you so much! I'm really glad you liked the video. 😊

[@shannonewald7193]

Excellent! Clear, concise and easy to follow. Loved the quick keys along the way. Thank you!

[@TheDesignNinja]

You're most welcome and thank you!

[@mequable]

Omg all these years and just now I learn about the Shape Builder tool.

[@jfm1964]

beautiful accent and straight to the point, thank you, very helpful

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you! 😊👍🏻

[@MrRobertocantaboni]

hi, i think your tutorial about the chart is the best i've seen ...

[@TheDesignNinja]

That's really nice of you to say-thank you! I'm trying to make the best and most useful content, so that's encouraging. :)

[@rosie2540]

thanks so much for this! best, clearest and most helpful tutorial i've seen.

[@TheDesignNinja]

You are most welcome, and thank you for your lovely feedback! Keep watching for more and it would be much appreciated if you could spread the word! :)

[@robertlamothe3109]

Excellent job in presenting! Very clear in each step and explaining shortcuts! Thanks for sharing your knowledge. Best to you!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you! Glad you appreciated. :)

[@keven_does]

Nice and direct explanation. Love it.

[@driggsy]

Amazing tutorial! I'll be using this on my media kit. Thank you so much 👏👏👏

[@jessicamoffitt2550]

You're a life saver! Wish I had thought to KZbin this earlier in the night :)

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thanks, Jessica-well, I'm pleased that you're all sorted and happy now! Don't forget to subscribe and spread the word! :)

[@FergbyFive]

Same here!

[@zerayacob3246]

you are a genius... thanks for the great content!

[@raquel_santana]

Thank u so much! It was exactly what I was looking for!

[@atspodcast7789]

Extremely helpful video. Thank you!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Very happy that it helped-and you're most welcome. Keep watching there's plenty more on the way. :)

[@JulianDN]

THank you Tony, this was very helpful. :) I'm working on my thesis for my Graphic Design degree and need to re do a bunch of graphs

[@marcusfalding]

Absolute live saver mate, nice one

[@alexm9615]

This was awesome, thank you - clearest Illustrator tutorial I've seen. Thanks a lot, subscribed!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you, that's praise indeed, and much appreciated. Keep watching and spread the word!

[@Sudhasnigdha]

very clear and easy presentation, thanks a ton

[@TheDesignNinja]

You are welcome, and thank you for the kind words. 😊

[@nuaveb]

You sir are a genius, thanks for sharing your knowledge!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you, and you are most welcome-glad you enjoyed. :)

[@belladieci]

This is so helpful! Thanks for making the tutorial easy to follow!

[@TheDesignNinja]

You're welcome Isabella-please be sure to subscribe for more! :)

[@jennt2250]

Great video! Editable Data! shortcut key commands! it's exactly what I needed!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Glad that you found what you needed! :)

[@abdullah302]

Watched many channels, many guys explaining as simple as they can but you my friend is on another level. You did it so nicely and calmly that I couldn't believe what I heard and saw. SUBSCRIBED... Thanks a lot and keep sharing. With Love from Pakistan

[@TheDesignNinja]

Wow, Abdullah-thank you! That's an amazing comment and you have really made my day with it. I'm so glad that you've enjoyed my content and I'll do my best to keep sharing-thank you again.

[@abdullah302]

@@TheDesignNinja my pleasure 😍

[@josephclerici591]

This is awesome, thanks! Been doing this wrong for two years.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Joseph! You're welcome and thank you for commenting-at least you'll be getting it right from now on. Spread the word!

[@JohnAspUK]

Thanks mate - this tut was just what I was after! Strange their graph tool doesnt do donuts out of the box. I got it all working but couldnt get the resize thickness working at all. Oh well maybe i missed a step, will do it again.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey John-you are most welcome! Try again and if it doesn't work for you, ket me know and I'll try to help. Do bear in mind that I'm on the road a lot at this time of year so it may take me a day or two to get back to you. :)

[@abbybishop7983]

Thanks so helpful!!!!

[@fransisqo]

So well explained, amazing, thank you so much!! :D

[@TheDesignNinja]

You're very welcome!

[@hello.nehasingh]

Hi, this is super useful and clear. Thank you for sharing. I have a Q, how does one resize the doughnut?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Use the Scale Tool. :)

[@neasingh]

@@TheDesignNinja Thanks, I was able to use the tool, though I had to convert the doughnut into curves first, making it non-editable for later. Is there a way around it? I use CS6.

[@liudmylasydorenko9347]

It's brilliant, thank youuuu!!!

[@TWESHELLSHOCKR]

You may have just solved my problem on how I need to tackle my infographic homework assignment

[@TheDesignNinja]

Great! I'm so glad I was able to help. Keep watching for more and don't forget to subscribe!

[@LucyGilbertson1]

Thank you for such a great video! This helped me so quickly!

[@popaduck14]

Extremely helpful, thank you!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thanks!

[@NancyHann]

Thank you! Very helpful. Do you also have a video that shows how to add text to the curved segments? That's a tricky one for me.

[@TheDesignNinja]

I don't currently but have just added it to the content list so there will be soon!

[@TheDesignNinja]

The video you need is now available, Nancy: kzbin.info/www/bejne/eYG2fWuJgZaHh5Y

[@evelinablomqvist]

What do you say at 4.26? What key do you hold down to punch the small one out?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey, thanks for asking and sorry if it wasn't clear, but it's the ALT key. Of course, some keyboards don't have an ALT key but instead it is called OPT or OPTION, but it is the same thing. :)

[@gabriellestevens5358]

Thank you, this was very helpful!!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Gabrielle! You're welcome-and thank you for commenting. Keep watching-there's plenty more to come! :)

[@amandallen2]

Thank you so much for posting this. It almost got me to what I am trying to accomplish. I was able to create the donut chart, but now I want to segment each part so I can animate them separately in another application. Is there a way to do that?

[@TheDesignNinja]

You can expand/ungroup the elements if you want to animate them in After Effects or Animate. There are SVG options too using javascript and/or CSS animations. I'd be interested to see how you tackle it and the results. Keep watching, and do spread the word! :)

[@suraiyaabedin9783]

i need this entire course. which course does this belong to? can anybody help me with this info? very nicely explained. loved it.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Suraiya! The course is available from LinkedIn Learning-www.linkedin.com/learning/creating-illustrator-infographics-if you have a premium membership then all the courses are included but otherwise you can buy the course for around $30. There is a lot of information in there!

[@Neadekvatish]

Вот это действительно отличный урок, благодарю!

[@TillWeDisappear]

Love it, so useful.Thanks

[@wendycasey7471]

How do I control the size of my chart? Let's say I want the overall donut to be 40px? Can that be done? And what about resizing the entire donut after you've created it? Thanks! Great tutorial!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Wendy, thank you! If you're resizing down all you should need to do is use the Transform panel and type in the new measurement-don't forget that you can convert between measurements by typing in, px, pt, pc, cm or mm after the numbers. Things to look out for: make sure that the transformation point is the centre, ideally and make sure that constrain proportions is enabled (looks like a chain link). Scaling up can be a little trickier, and you're best using the Scale Tool to do that. Hope that answers your question, and really glad you enjoyed the tutorial-if you're not already, be sure to subscribe for more and spread the word!

[@felipecarvalho8463]

Thank you so much! You're the best!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Aw, thanks, Felipe! I'm very grateful for you taking the time to provide feedback-especially when it's so nice! Glad you're enjoying the movies, and there's a lot more to come shortly, including some live streams. Keep watching!

[@digital-alchemist]

Awesome tutorial, m8! My new slide deck is going to look sweet :)

[@melinaeisinger9901]

Hi! I'm trying to make the circle but illustrator won't show me the center point in my chart, I activated the smart guides but still does not show up, do you know why that happens?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey. The chart tools are so old, they don't work with the smart guides! It's crazy. 😔

[@markelliot2994]

Spot on mate! Many thanks!

[@theartworks232]

thanks much bros, much needed help !

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Akash, I'm really glad you found it useful, and thank you for letting me know. :)

[@marknicolas6442]

I cant seem to change the size of the graph afterwards though, it does like a weird thing when I resize it

[@TheDesignNinja]

You need to use the Scale Tool to transform graphs in clipping groups-then it'll work. :)

[@jackiesariah4]

thanks so much for this! now that I have my donut chart, I want to pull apart the pieces. Can you explain how to do that?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Jackie. Thank you! If you mean that you'd like each individual section to new locations, then you're most likely going to have to lose the connection between the graph and the data. Is there any way you can share with me a sketch of what it is you'd like to achieve just so that I can be certain? If you could put an image on Dropbox, Instagram or whatever, then comment again here, or add a message to my page on FB: facebook.com/TonyHarmerTraining/ and I'll take a look

[@CatherineLawsonShineDigital]

Very helpful, thanks

[@hollytoner4587]

thank you soooooo much - BUT the pie tool isn't in the dop down option anymore (think its the adobe update??) you have to double click on the bar chart tool after you've hit j to get up the other graph options - only saying this as I spent 30 minutes trying to find the pie tool :(( BUT THANK YOU

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hi, it is still there! Tap J on your keyboard, then long press on that icon in the toolbox and you'll see it in the stack that is revealed.

[@markelliot2994]

Good tutorial...but how can you resize these without them 'breaking'?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thanks, Mark. You need to use the Scale Tool. Select the graph as you would normally, tap S on your keyboard, enter a uniform scaling value, and hit return.

[@hansmller9747]

Thank you. Clever way to use tools in ai.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thanks, Hans-keep watching, there's plenty more to come! :)

[@JonesyJay]

My column graph tool does not have more toolbox options - they are all grayed out?

[@lleexx10]

When selecting the colors, make sure RGB is selected instead of grayscale

[@irissjuhh14]

Thanks for this great tutorial but the moment I make a clipping mask of my graph I can't edit the data..

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Iris, thank you for your comment and sorry for the slight delay in replying. Once you have added the clipping mask, use the Group Selection Tool (nested with the Direct Selection Tool) to select the graph, then right-click to access the data option. Let me know if you;re still having difficulty and we'll get you up and running as soon as possible. :)

[@VyLe.91]

Thank you for this, super helpful video. However, the date input has 8 slots, but pie chart always comes out short 1, any idea how to fix this?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Double check your data-there may be an illegal character in there somewhere

[@VyLe.91]

@@TheDesignNinja Thank you! Still don't know what wrong, but make new chart and it comes out so great!!! I learn a lot from your videos

[@TheDesignNinja]

Glad it's all good now, and thanks for the kind words-much appreciated!

[@mrlborges]

I was trying to a key to my donut graph, but it will be inside the clipping mask so you can't see it. I tried adding a square on the side of the donut and merged both together, but then the graph disappears. Any ideas?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey. Build your key shape as the clipping mask before applying it to the chart, and also any other art you need to show through the clipping mask needs to be in place first. Hope that makes sense. This may be a fun tut to make-I may do it this week. :)

[@TheDesignNinja]

Just a thought-I may have misunderstood-did you mean a Legend?

[@mrlborges]

@@TheDesignNinja yes I meant a legend explaing what the colors in the graph mean.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thought so. The easiest way to do this is usually to make the legend separately, but if you want it to be the generated legend than there is a way: 1. Make sure the legend is where you want it to be (you can move it with the Group Selection Tool) then draw a rectangle over it, which will form one part of your mask. 2. draw the circles you will use to create the doughnut. 3. Select the inner circle and cut it to the clipboard. 4. Select the rectangle and the outer circle and turn them into a compound path (CMD-8 or CTRL-8). 5. Double-click the compound shape to isolate it and then use the Paste in Place command to paste in the circle. 6. Exit isolation mode, select the shape and your chart, then use CMD-7 (CTRL-7 on Windows) to create the clipping mask. :)

[@mrlborges]

@@TheDesignNinja thanks, man. I'll try this method next time I have to deal with this kind of chart.

[@jamesjordan-davies2704]

Thank You so much :)

[@khalishahardya5687]

this helped! thankyou

[@TheDesignNinja]

Really pleased it helped and thanks for letting me know. :)

[@amanazar2597]

thanks

[@danielgennaro7896]

You cant use the effect 3D tool then after doing it this way correct?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey. Yes you can still use the 3D effect, but it may slow down a little. :)

[@lleexx10]

wont let me hit control 7. Says its not a clipping mask. I'm following everything exactly. I've tried probably a hundred times now and nothing. Please help I swear I'm going crazy.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Sorry for the huge delay in reply-I've had to be off for a few weeks-and you need to make absolutely sure that you have the graph and the object to clip it into are selected. Hope that helps.

[@Angel-486]

4:19 I don't get it: what is the key that we have to tap ? (sorry, I'm not english) I tried with N, and M but both don't work... :(

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Angel. You need to hold down the SHIFT key and tap M to access the Shape Builder Tool-if it is different in your region, the easiest way to find out is to go to the tool in the toolbox and hover over it's icon, then the shortcut will be shown as a tooltip. You don't have to apologize for not being English-it's often my feeling that I have to because I am! ;)

[@prasannarn946]

Cool! Thanks a ton!

[@gabrielrml]

Could you show how you might subdivide one of the arc colours into a given number of equal parts please?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey. The pie will divide according to the numbers input into the data fields, either as numbers or percentages. If you want to see divisions in a block and have those all the same colour, then leave the strokes intact on the pie chart. Hope that helps!

[@gabrielrml]

I haven't made myself clear . Imagine one of the data sets - lets say the red arch, subdivided into say 6 equal parts while the others remain as shown. Is this done at the data input level and if so how? Or is there a quick and and way to subdivide an arch in Illustrator?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Gabriel-if you want to keep the data live, you'd do this at the data input level. Let's say that in the case of the example used on the poster for this movie, the total for the red area was 60, the orange area 25 and the yellow area was 15; you'd divide the 60 by 6, giving each segment a value of 10. Hope that helps.

[@gabrielrml]

OK one more try - lets say the red area was 60 as you indicated - the 60 was made up 20%a, 10%b, 50%c, and 20%d - for example (appreciate these are not equal I just used equal amounts to illustrate the point - hope this is clear now. There would be 4 SUBDIVISIONS totalling 100% which accounted for the 60 part in the whole chart.Thanks for your help though.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hi Gabriel-apologies for the delay but it's a day-job day, and I didn't see your reply until today. I think we were having an articulation go-slow yesterday, and I wanted to make sure I gave you a satisfactory answer, so I've just knocked up a quick post on my blog that will hopefully nail it for you: bit.ly/2meMKtO I am experiencing a couple of issues with the blog at the moment, so please be patient if there's a short lag in the page rendering-I'm working on it.

[@eldonchino]

even better if can link to csv file or excel file

[@TheDesignNinja]

That is probably the #1 most requested feature with the chart tools! Why don''t you add it as a feature request here: illustrator.uservoice.com/

[@ahmedfouda5929]

thanks so much for this! best

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thanks so much, Ahmed! Keep watching and be sure to subscribe.

[@ahmedfouda5929]

hhh sure

[@nTudor]

THANK YOU!

[@TheDesignNinja]

You're most welcome! :)

[@nik1128]

Thank you!!!!

[@TheDesignNinja]

You're welcome, and thank you for taking the time to comment-much appreciated. If you'd like some free Design Ninja stickers, like my FB page (facebook.com/thedesignninja) PM an address we can ship to (doesn't have to be home) and some will be on the way!

[@martinaavila285]

Heyo, I followed this tutorial and now I want to export the image to png, but for some reason, the image shows as a pie chart without the hole. I also tried linking the Illustrator file directly into InDesign and the same thing happened. Please help!

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hi. When you're exporting the image to png, are you making sure that the Transparent option is checked? If it is, then check Effect > Document Raster Effects Settings… and make sure that the transparengt option there is also checked. Hope that helps.

[@martinaavila285]

@@TheDesignNinja thanks!

[@SKDRecords]

you have to pay for it?

[@butchbalsomo]

How do you put gap though?

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Butch-do you mean have a slice missing? Simply give it both a fill and stroke of "none". If that's not what you meant, let me know. :)

[@butchbalsomo]

A gap allowance on each portion.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Thank you. I'm not entirely sure that you should have gaps as it may suggest that the data is incomplete, perhaps? That said, I have seen this done, where the chart is "exploded" to move the segments apart in a design, and this is such a good problem that I'm going to make it the subject of the next movie. Stay tuned.

[@ptrsbeasty]

Dope

[@lurkst3r]

2022 Update: If you add your datapoints (pie segments) in the second row and leave a zero figure in the first row, Illustrator will automatically create the donut shape for you. 👍

[@EmanDeMoan]

You are a god.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Best. Overstatement. Ever. But thank you for you appreciation! Keep watching!

[@mohamadassraff8552]

i cannot color in different color. i click yellow all yellow.

[@TheDesignNinja]

Hey Mohamad-make sure that you're using the Group Selection Tool to pick the object you'd like to color. Also, make sure that nothing is selected before you do that-sometimes the whole object remains selected and that wil be why everything is changing.

[@S4NTIS0]

Cant select the inner circle

[@TheDesignNinja]

Use the Direct Selection Tool or Group Selection Tool :)

[@_ThatJaceKid]

You're the fuckin man