Donut chart maker

The hole is the point

A donut is a pie chart with the middle removed, and almost every argument about which is better misses what actually changed.

Removing the centre costs you a small amount of readability. In a pie, the wedges meet at a point, and that shared vertex gives the eye an anchor for comparing angles. Take it away and you are comparing arc lengths instead, which is marginally harder.

What you get in return is the most valuable real estate on the chart. The middle of a circle is where the eye goes first, and in a donut it is empty and available. Put the total there, or the one number the chart exists to communicate, and you have a chart that answers its own question before the reader has looked at a single segment.

That trade is worth making whenever there is a headline figure. It is not worth making when there isn't one — if the middle would just hold a title or a logo, use a pie.

What to put in the centre

In rough order of usefulness:

1. The total. "$7.7 million" above the segments makes the donut self-contained — the reader gets the size of the whole and its composition in one object.
2. The headline share. "62% Core" when one segment is the story.
3. The count behind the percentages. "1,284 responses" gives the reader the sample size without a footnote.
4. Nothing. Acceptable. Better than a logo.

Say put the total in the centre or put 62% in the centre.

The progress donut

There is a second, quite different use for this chart: a single value against a target, drawn as one filled arc and one empty arc, with the percentage in the middle.

This is not really a part-to-whole chart. It is a gauge — the visual equivalent of a progress bar, used for things like "68% of the quarterly goal", "82% of seats filled", "40 of 60 tickets resolved". It works because the number in the centre carries the precision and the arc carries the sense of how far along you are.

Two rules for these. The whole must be a genuine ceiling — a target, a capacity, a total possible — not just a bigger number. And one value per donut; if you have four metrics, that is four small donuts in a row, not four rings inside each other.

Prompt: Progress donut showing 68% of the quarterly target, with 68% in the centre

When to use a donut chart

It works well for:

• A total and its split in one object — revenue by product with the total in the middle
• Two to five categories where one clearly dominates
• Dashboard and deck tiles, where the compact square shape and the big centre number fit a small space
• A single metric against a target, as a progress donut
• Survey composition where the respondent count belongs in the centre

Reach for something else when:

Your situation	Better chart	Why
More than about six segments	Bar chart	Thin arcs are harder to read than thin wedges
No headline number for the centre	Pie chart	Without a centre figure you are giving up readability for nothing
Precise ranking is needed	Bar chart	Arc length is read poorly
Comparing the split across periods	Stacked bar	Several donuts cannot be compared reliably
Several metrics at once	Several small donuts	Nested rings are unreadable
Parts that do not form a whole	Bar chart	The closed ring asserts completeness

Two worked examples

1. Revenue with the total in the middle

Data:

Product	Revenue
Core	42000000
Pro	21000000
Enterprise	14000000

Prompt: Donut of revenue by product in $ million, total in the centre. The point is that Core is more than half.

What you get: three segments sorted largest first from 12 o'clock, "$7.7 million" in the centre, percentages in the legend. The reader gets the size of the business and its composition without reading a single label.

2. Survey results with the sample size

Data:

Response	Count
Very satisfied	540
Satisfied	410
Neutral	220
Dissatisfied	114

Prompt: Donut of satisfaction responses with the total response count in the centre, keep the original order

What you get: four segments in their natural order — not sorted, because a satisfaction scale runs from one end to the other and reordering it by size would destroy the sequence — with "1,284 responses" in the middle.

This is a case where keep the original order matters. Sorting a Likert scale by frequency makes it unreadable.

Four things that ruin a donut chart

1. Nested rings. Two or three concentric donuts showing different datasets is a chart that looks sophisticated and communicates nothing. Inner rings have shorter arcs for identical percentages, so the same value looks different depending on which ring it lands in. Use small multiples.

2. A logo in the centre. You have taken the readability hit of removing the middle and then spent the space on decoration. Either use the centre for data or use a pie.

3. A ring so thin it becomes a circle. Past a certain thinness the segments stop reading as quantities. The ring needs enough width that the arcs have visible area.

4. Too many segments. The same six-item ceiling as a pie, and slightly stricter, because a thin arc is harder to identify than a wedge that reaches the centre. Say group anything under 3% into Other.

Getting your data in

Two columns: category and value. Counts or percentages both work — counts get converted, percentages get used as given.

Naming your units means the legend, centre figure and subtitle read correctly. There is no value axis on a donut chart, so units live in the labels rather than along an edge.

How to make one

1. Paste two columns, category and value.
2. Say donut chart so it does not infer the type.
3. Say what goes in the centre — the total, a headline percentage, or the response count.
4. Name your units so the centre figure and legend read correctly.
5. Adjust in words. Keep the original order. Group anything under 3% into Other. Put the total in the centre.
6. Export — SVG for slides, PNG for a quick paste, PDF for print.

Related chart types

• Pie chart — the same data with a solid centre. Slightly easier to compare, no room for a headline figure.
• Stacked bar — when you need the same composition across several groups or time periods.
• Bar chart — when ranking accuracy matters more than the sense of a whole.

Exporting

SVG, PNG and PDF, on every plan including free. SVG is the one to use — curved strokes and a centre number are exactly where raster scaling shows. See pricing for what the paid plans add.