How to Add Error Bars in Excel

Whether you’re a statistician or need to track variables in your monthly sales, Error Bars in Excel can provide a great visual on just how accurate your numbers or measurements are compared to the actual value.

With Excel’s built-in measurements using percentages, deviations, and more, you should be able to get a more accurate picture of your data. Below is how to use Excel’s Error Bars to get you a more accurate idea of your measurements.

How to Add Error Bars in Excel

Adding Error Bars to your Excel chart is a relatively simple process. Best of all, if you need to remove it, simply reverse the instructions.

1. Select the chart within your Excel spreadsheet.

2. Select Chart Elements, represented by a green plus (+) sign next to the top right of the chart.

   

3. Select Error Bars. You can also select the arrow next to Error Bars, then select Standard Error, Percentage, Standard Deviation, or More Options.

   

   Standard Error, Percentage, and Standard Deviation are predefined in Excel.

4. For more customized settings, select More Options.

   

5. The Add Error Bars dialog will open up. Choose which Series to customize, then select OK.

   

6. A side window will open within Excel. Here you can adjust the Direction, End Style, and the Error Amount of the Error Bar using a Fixed value, Percentage, Standard deviation, Standard error, or create a Custom value.

   

Using Error Bars' More Options

If you choose to customize your error bars in your chart, as explained above, there is the More Options setting. More Options gives you the ability to make several customizations, including some colorization of different aspects of the Error Bars.

1. After selecting Error Bars > More Options, you’ll be prompted to select which series to add Error Bars to. Select the Series, then select OK.

   

2. The Format Error Bars side window will open. Depending on what type of chart you have, the options will change slightly. In this example, a horizontal bar chart was chosen.

   

   Scatter charts can display both horizontal and vertical error bars. To get rid of them, select them, then press the Delete key.

3. The Horizontal Error Bar section contains 2 different settings. Under Direction, you have a few options for the Error Bar:

   • Both: Error Bar goes in both directions
   • Minus: Error Bar goes to the right of the line
   • Plus: Error Bar goes to the left of the line

   

4. The End Style gives you the option to have a Cap or No Cap on the end of your Error Bar.

   

5. The last section sets the Error Amount. Here you can set a customized Fixed value, Percentage, or Standard Deviation. You can also select Standard Error or Custom to add further customization to the Error Amount.

   

6. If you choose Custom, select Specify Value.

   

7. From here, you can adjust the Positive and Negative Error Value. Once set, select OK.

   

8. You can repeat this process for each series by selecting the dropdown menu next to Error Bar Options.