Create a Box and Whisker Plot in Tableau

While I was working on a sales analysis in a retail company, I needed to compare sales performance across different product sub-categories. Along with the sales total, I also wanted to see the sales difference within each category and understand the distribution.

For this, I had to create a chart that could show the spread of values, highlight outliers, and visible comparison of data.

To visualize this data, I created a Box and Whisker Plot in Tableau. In this tutorial, I will explain what a box and whisker plot, or box plot, is in Tableau.

What is a Box and Whisker Plot in Tableau?

In Tableau, a box and whisker plot, also known as a boxplot, is used to display the distribution of a dataset, including its median, quartiles, and outliers.

A box and whisker plot in Tableau summarizes a dataset’s distribution using five key points:

• Minimum: The smallest data point (excluding outliers).
• First Quartile (Q1): The 25th percentile, marking the lower boundary of the middle 50% of data.
• Median: The middle value, representing typical performance.
• Third Quartile (Q3): The 75th percentile, marking the upper boundary of the middle 50% of data.
• Maximum: The largest data point (excluding outliers).

The box represents the interquartile range (IQR), which contains the middle 50% of the data, while the whiskers extend to the minimum and maximum values. Outliers, calculated as points beyond 1.5 * IQR from Q1 or Q3, appear as individual dots.

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Create a Box and Whisker Plot in Tableau

In this example, we will create a box and whisker plot in Tableau, which will give a summary of Sales for each Sub-Category, divided by Order Month.

For this, connect to the Tableau superstore database and follow the steps below.

1. Add the Sub-Category or Category to the Columns and then add Sales to the Rows shelf.

With this, we will get a bar chart displaying the sales of product sub-categories.

2. Add the Order Date to the details card in the Marks section. The order date will be in year format, and it will distribute the sales of products for each year.

3. To divide and distribute the data further by month, click on the Order Date in the details and select Month. This will show the sales of the products distributed in months.

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4. Reduce the circle size using the slider size card; this is required to show data points more accurately, otherwise they will appear as overlapped.

5. Using the circle data points, we will create the box and whiskers. For this, right-click on the X-axis and select Add Reference line.

6. In the reference, select the Box Plot. To hide the circle data point and only show the box and whiskers, select the checkbox Hide underlying marks.

Here, we can also format the color of the box and whisker borders in the Formatting section.

At last, click on the OK button.

Now, you will see the data statistics displayed through the box and whiskers.

Now, the plot shows the distribution of sales for each sub-category, with boxes indicating the IQR, lines for medians, whiskers for the range, and dots for outliers.

This way, we can create a box-and-whisker plot in Tableau by following the above steps.

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Create a Box and Whisker Plot using Built-in Plot

In the above example, we have created a box and whisker plot by selecting the rows and columns, changing the chart type to circle, and defining the reference lines.

There is another option to create a box and whisker plot in Tableau, which is using the built-in box and whisker plot. Now, follow the steps below to create a box-and-whisker plot using the built-in option.

In the example, we will create a box plot to see how profit varies by sub-category in the dataset.

1. For the dimension, add the Sub-category to the columns, and for the measure, add the Profit to the rows.
2. With this, Tableau will create a bar chart by default. Now, go to the Show Me tab and select the box-and-whisker option.

3. Now, the box plot will set the dimension as a detail. Here, add another dimension of profit to define the sales distribution across regions.

Now, the data will be displayed in the box-and-whisker chart format. The plot displays profit distribution by sub-category, segmented by region, highlighting variability and outliers.

This way, we can create a box-and-whisker chart in Tableau by following the above steps.

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I hope that with the help of the examples above, you understand what a box and whisker plot is and how to create one in Tableau using both the manual and built-in methods.

You may also like to read:

• Create Heat Map in Tableau
• Create a Scatterplot in Tableau
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Bijay Kumar

I am Bijay Kumar, the founder of SalesforceFAQs.com. Having over 10 years of experience working in salesforce technologies for clients across the world (Canada, Australia, United States, United Kingdom, New Zealand, etc.). I am a certified salesforce administrator and expert with experience in developing salesforce applications and projects. My goal is to make it easy for people to learn and use salesforce technologies by providing simple and easy-to-understand solutions. Check out the complete profile on About us.