We blog about everything to do with data visualisation and data storytelling, across a wide range of technologies but our favourite ecosystem for dataviz is R.

Beyond Plotly: interactive dataviz with R

Plotly abandoned r in September 2025. Start your new year expanding your vision of what’s possible with interactive data visualisation in R through {htmlwidgets}.
Jan 21, 2026
1 min
Elmo rise meme format showing Elmo superimposed on flames with his arms wide and the plotly company logo showing above.

Plotly abandoned R in 2025. Start 2026 thinking if it really is your best choice.

Plotly isn’t magic, it’s powered by {htmlwidgets} which unlocks a vast universe of interactive dataviz with over 133 packages! Consider if you should move beyond Plotly.

Jan 5, 2026
Charlotte Jane Hadley
16 min
Annotated ggplot2 code demonstrating the difference between dataviz-level and geom-specific aesthetics.

{ggplot2}’s two level aesthetics: dataviz or geom-specific

It’s the aesthetics that power {ggplot2} but there are two different levels of aes(), dataviz level and geom-specific.

Jan 2, 2026
Charlotte Jane Hadley
7 min
Choropleth showing which countries drive on the left (shaded red) and which drive on the right (shaded green).

UX and dataviz should talk more

There’s a lot more that UX and dataviz should talk about, especially affordances for common interaction elements.

Dec 30, 2025
Charlotte Jane Hadley
4 min
Procedural art showing smooth curved lines arranged to appear similar to the elemental stones from the movie Fifth Element.

Curves and stones

Recreating the elemental stones with {ggplot2}

Dec 29, 2025
Charlotte Jane Hadley
13 min
Screenshot of the code do.call(hc_xAxis, c(list(hc_marital_bar_chart), list_hc_xaxis_args) with the corresponding horizontal bar chart produced by highcharter.

Highcharts, do.call and c(list())

Getting around Error: All arguments must be named list, and why does do.call() want c(list(), list(…)) with htmlwidgets?

Dec 10, 2025
Charlotte Jane Hadley
4 min

Your year in ggplot2 with {ggplot2wrapped} 2025!

Merry Christmas! Visualise your year in geoms with Charlotte Hadley’s newly released package {ggplot2wrapped} and learn a quick story about Abstract Syntax Trees for parsing R code files.

Dec 1, 2025
5 min

Announcing our launch workshop!

We’re very excited to finally be launching GCPDS in November 2025!
Nov 3, 2025
9 min

Welcome to the Graph | Plot | Chart | Data Story Brand

At GPCDS we’re purposefully provoking comparisons and challenging assumptions within the field of data visualisation. To evoke the feeling that everything could be…
Oct 31, 2025
Charlotte Hadley
27 min
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