Best way to put piecharts and bargraphs in Indesign

[chaek51632355]

Hello, 

I am supposed to make this kind of piecharts, bargraphs and more and put it into an InDesign document. What would be the best way to do this? I was thinking about making the chart in Illustrator and linking it but is this the most efficient way? Also, if I do make piecharts and bar graphs in Illustrator, would it be better to export it as a png and putting it into Indesign or directly linking the Ai file? There would be at least 50 of each charts. 

Sorry if this is worded weirdly, English isn't my first language. 

[jmlevy · Accepted solution]

You can create your piecharts and bar graphs in Illustrator, but export them as native ai files, or PDFs, but not PNG. You also can create pie charts (but not bar graphs) directly in InDesign with this amazing script:

https://www.indiscripts.com/post/2020/02/claquos-2020-is-out

You could also have a look to Chartwell font, designed to create graphs:

https://www.fontshop.com/families/ff-chartwell

[chaek51632355]

Thanks for the reply! I haven't heard of scripts before! I'll look in to it! Also, if I link charts and graphs as an ai file, would the indesign file become like, laggy or too heavy at all? 

[Eugene Tyson · Accepted solution]

I create my charts/bargraphs in Illustrator and the place them into indesign.

https://helpx.adobe.com/ie/illustrator/using/graphs.html

[chaek51632355]

Thanks for the reply! I guess there is no easy way around this. Do you also put the words on the piechart in Illustrator?

[Eugene Tyson]

It depends. 

Sometimes I leave them off and add them in InDesign.

[Lukas Engqvist]

If you have text the important thing is to remember that scaling a placed chart will also scale the text if text is in illustrator. If you do the charts in the same size as they will be in InDesign then this is not an issue.

On a sidenote there is a font for simple charts amazing-infographic font not at all as impressive as chartwell.

There is also a plugin/script from indiscripts, claquos-3 if thhis is right for you depends on your work.

Using Illustrator and saving natively or adding your charts to a library and then placing to indesign is a well tried and tested workflow.