Building Next JS Charts with Recharts and Shadcn UI

Building Next JS Charts with Recharts and Shadcn UI is a great way to create interactive and visually appealing charts for your Next JS application.

Recharts, a popular charting library, is used in conjunction with Shadcn UI to create stunning charts.

You can create a variety of charts, including line charts, bar charts, and pie charts, using Recharts.

Recharts supports a range of customization options, including colors, fonts, and animations.

To get started, you'll need to install Recharts and Shadcn UI in your Next JS project.

Shadcn UI provides a set of pre-designed UI components, including charts, that can be easily integrated into your application.

You can start building your first chart with Next JS charts. It's a great way to get familiar with the tool.

To begin, let's build your first chart. We'll build a bar chart, add a grid, axis, tooltip and legend. This will give you a solid foundation to work with.

Next JS charts are designed to be easy to use, even for beginners. You can create a bar chart, for example, with just a few clicks.

To get started with Next.js charts, you'll need to define your data first. Your data can be in any shape, so don't worry about it conforming to a specific structure.

You can use libraries like axios or the built-in fetch API to fetch real data from APIs or databases if you prefer not to simulate data. This is especially useful if you have a real-world dashboard that requires up-to-date information.

The data used to plot charts in Recharts typically has a similar structure: an array of objects with each object containing the data you want to plot on the chart. This might look something like an array of objects with various properties.

You can request data from a database that stores your application data, or pull it from an external data provider like Google Analytics. Alternatively, you can get data from a real-time source like Ably.

Chart Components are designed with composition in mind, allowing you to build charts using Recharts components and only bringing in custom components when needed.

The Recharts components can be imported and added to your component in a step-by-step process. For example, to create a bar chart, you'll need to import the BarChart, Bar, Legend, and XAxis components.

Here are the components required for a bar chart:

Similarly, for a line chart, you'll need to import the LineChart, Line, CartesianGrid, and XAxis components.

The Component section is where Recharts shines. We designed the chart component with composition in mind, allowing you to build your charts using Recharts components and only bringing in custom components when needed.

This means you're not locked into an abstraction, giving you the flexibility to upgrade to new Recharts versions without any issues. By not wrapping Recharts, you can easily follow the official upgrade path to keep your charts up-to-date.

Here's a quick rundown of the key components you'll be working with:

By using Recharts components, you can create a variety of charts, from simple line charts to complex radar charts. And with the flexibility to bring in custom components, you can tailor your charts to fit your specific needs.

To create a bar chart, you'll need to use the Recharts components. Specifically, you'll need the BarChart, Bar, and Legend components. The BarChart component is the main component representing the bar chart, and you'll pass the data array as a prop to it.

The Bar component defines the bars to be plotted on the chart. You'll specify the dataKey prop as "value" to determine which property of the data objects should be used as the bar height. For a double bar chart, you'll use two Bar components.

To add a legend to the chart, you'll use the Legend component. This will display a color-coded key for the bars representing different data series at the bottom of the chart.

Here's a list of the Recharts components required for a Bar chart:

You can also configure the BarChart component in many different ways, as explained in the Rechart docs.

Adding an axis to your chart is a straightforward process. We can start with the x-axis, as mentioned in the example, by using the XAxis component.

To add a y-axis, we'll use the YAxis component, similar to how we added the x-axis. This will give us a clear view of our data on both axes.

In some cases, you may want to add a secondary axis to your chart, which can be useful for comparing two different data sets. This can be done using the SecondaryAxis component.

The type of axis you choose will depend on the type of data you're working with and the message you want to convey. For example, if you're showing categorical data, you may want to use a category axis.

To import and add Shadcn components to your chart, you'll need to import the necessary components and add them to your component. This will allow you to create a custom tooltip and cartesian grid background.

First, import the components provided by Shadcn, such as ChartTooltip, CartesianGrid, and XAxis. These components will help you create a bar chart with a custom tooltip and cartesian grid background.

To add the addons, simply add the following components: XAxis, CartesianGrid, and ChartTooltip. This will give you the basic structure for your chart.

You can customize your tooltip by using the ChartTooltip and ChartTooltipContent components. These components allow you to add a custom tooltip to your chart with a label, name, indicator, and value.