Building Your First Dashboard in Visualization Studio

Visualization Studio turns your raw data into interactive dashboards that update in real time. Whether you need a sales overview for your team or an executive summary for the board, this tutorial gets you from zero to a polished dashboard.

What You Will Learn

How to create a new dashboard workspace
How to add charts, tables, and KPI cards
How to connect widgets to live data sources
How to share dashboards with your team

Prerequisites

At least one data source synced via Data Sync
Data visible in Data Hub

Step 1: Create a New Dashboard

From the sidebar, click Visualization Studio then + New Dashboard. Give it a name — for example, "Q1 Sales Overview" — and choose a layout template. You can start with:

Blank canvas — full creative freedom
Executive summary — pre-arranged KPI cards and trend charts
Operations monitor — real-time metrics with status indicators

Step 2: Add Your First Widget

Click + Add Widget in the toolbar. Choose from:

Bar chart — comparisons across categories
Line chart — trends over time
Pie/Donut chart — proportional breakdowns
KPI card — single-metric highlights with change indicators
Table — detailed row-level data

Select Bar Chart for this walkthrough.

Step 3: Connect to Data

The widget editor opens. Under Data Source, select the entity from Data Hub — for example, orders. Then configure:

X-Axis:    product_category
Y-Axis:    SUM(revenue)
Filter:    date >= "2025-01-01"
Sort:      revenue DESC
Limit:     10

Click Preview to see the chart with live data. Adjust colors, labels, and formatting to match your brand.

Step 4: Arrange and Resize

Drag widgets to rearrange them. Resize by pulling the corners. The grid system snaps widgets into clean alignments. Add more widgets — try a KPI card showing total revenue and a line chart for monthly trends.

Tip: Use the Auto-layout button to let Visualization Studio arrange widgets optimally based on their types and sizes.

Step 5: Share Your Dashboard

Click Share in the top-right corner. You can:

Invite team members by email — they see live data, not a static snapshot
Generate a public link — read-only, no login required
Schedule email reports — PDF snapshots delivered daily or weekly

Conclusion

You now have a live, interactive dashboard. As new data flows through Data Sync, your charts update automatically. Next, explore Cognify to ask AI-powered questions about the data behind your dashboards.