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excel chart pie

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zmworm edited this page Apr 29, 2026 · 17 revisions

Excel: Chart - pie

A dedicated page for the pie chart type. Pie charts display proportional data as slices of a circle. They support one series with per-slice coloring, explosion, rotation, data labels, and the full set of shared chart styling properties (title, legend, fills, borders, layout, shadow, transparency).

Path: /{SheetName}/chart[N]

Add command shape:

officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie \
  --prop title="Market Share" \
  --prop data="Share:40,30,20,10" \
  --prop categories="Product A,Product B,Product C,Other" \
  <styling props>

See also: Chart - add, Chart - set, doughnut for the ring variant, and the full runnable demo at examples/excel/charts-pie.md.

Chart type variants

Type string OOXML element Description
pie c:pieChart Standard 2D pie
pie3d c:pie3DChart 3D pie with perspective

Pie-specific properties

Slice explosion

Property Default Notes
explosion / explode 0 Pull all slices outward (0-400)
series{N}.point{M}.explosion 0 Per-slice explosion 
# Explode all slices
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] --prop explosion=25

# Explode just the first slice
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] --prop series1.point1.explode=30

First slice angle

Property Default Notes
firstSliceAngle / sliceAngle 0 Rotation of first slice in degrees (0-360) 
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] --prop firstSliceAngle=90

Per-slice colors

Pie charts use per-data-point colors (not per-series). The colors property sets the palette; individual points can be overridden.

Property Default Notes
colors theme accents Comma-separated hex colors for slices
point{N}.color — Override individual slice color 
officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie \
  --prop data="Market:40,30,20,10" \
  --prop categories="A,B,C,D" \
  --prop colors="4472C4,ED7D31,70AD47,FFC000"

Data labels

Property Default Notes
dataLabels false true, percent, value, category, all
labelPos / labelPosition bestFit center, insideEnd, outsideEnd, bestFit
labelFont — "size:color:bold"
dataLabels.separator — Separator between label parts
dataLabels.numFmt — Number format for labels 
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] --prop dataLabels=percent

# Labels with custom font
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] \
  --prop dataLabels=all \
  --prop "labelFont=10:333333:true"

Transparency and opacity

Property Default Notes
transparency 0 Series transparency (0-100%)
opacity / alpha 100 Series opacity (0-100%) 
# Translucent slices
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] --prop transparency=30

Title styling

Property Default Notes
title — Chart title text
title.font / titleFont — Font family
title.size / titleSize — Font size (pt)
title.color / titleColor — Font color (hex)
title.bold / titleBold — Bold (true/false)
title.glow / titleGlow — Glow: "COLOR-RADIUS-OPACITY" or "none"
title.shadow / titleShadow — Shadow: "COLOR-BLUR-ANGLE-DIST-OPACITY" or "none" 
officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie \
  --prop title="Revenue Breakdown" \
  --prop title.size=16 --prop title.bold=true \
  --prop title.font="Arial" --prop title.color=1F2937 \
  --prop data="Rev:55,25,20" --prop categories="US,EU,APAC"

Legend

Property Default Notes
legend true Position: top, bottom, left, right, none
legend.overlay false Float legend on top of the chart
legendFont / legend.font — "size:color:fontname" 
officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie \
  --prop data="Share:40,30,20,10" --prop categories="A,B,C,D" \
  --prop legend=right \
  --prop "legendfont=9:6B7280:Arial"

Fills and borders

Property Default Notes
plotFill / plotAreaFill — Plot area background: hex, gradient "C1-C2[:angle]", or "none"
chartFill / chartAreaFill — Chart area background
plotArea.border / plotBorder — Plot area outline: "color:width:dash" or "none"
chartArea.border / chartBorder — Chart area outline 
# Light background with border
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] \
  --prop chartFill=F8F9FA \
  --prop plotFill=FFFFFF \
  --prop "chartArea.border=D0D0D0:1:solid"

Series shadow and outline

Property Default Notes
series.shadow / seriesShadow — "COLOR-BLUR-ANGLE-DIST-OPACITY" or "none"
series.outline / seriesOutline — "COLOR-WIDTH" e.g. "FFFFFF-0.5" or "none" 
# White outline between slices + drop shadow
officecli set data.xlsx /Sheet1/chart[1] \
  --prop "series.outline=FFFFFF-1" \
  --prop "series.shadow=000000-4-315-3-40"

Layout control

Property Default Notes
x, y 0 Chart position (column/row index)
width 8 Chart width (column units)
height 15 Chart height (row units)
plotArea.x/y/w/h — Manual plot area layout (0-1 decimal)
title.x/y/w/h — Manual title layout
legend.x/y/w/h — Manual legend layout 
officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie \
  --prop data="Share:40,30,20,10" --prop categories="A,B,C,D" \
  --prop x=0 --prop y=0 --prop width=10 --prop height=18

3D settings

Property Default Notes
view3d / camera / perspective — "rotX,rotY,perspective" e.g. "30,0,0"

Applies only to pie3d chart type. For pie charts, rotY controls the horizontal rotation of the pie and rotX controls the tilt angle.

officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie3d \
  --prop data="Rev:55,25,20" --prop categories="US,EU,APAC" \
  --prop "view3d=30,0,0"

Full example: presentation-grade pie chart

officecli add data.xlsx /Sheet1 --type chart \
  --prop chartType=pie \
  --prop title="Q4 Revenue by Region" \
  --prop title.size=16 --prop title.bold=true \
  --prop title.font="Arial" --prop title.color=1F2937 \
  --prop data="Revenue:45,28,17,10" \
  --prop categories="North America,Europe,Asia Pacific,Other" \
  --prop colors="4472C4,ED7D31,70AD47,FFC000" \
  --prop firstSliceAngle=90 \
  --prop explosion=5 \
  --prop dataLabels=percent \
  --prop labelPos=outsideEnd \
  --prop "labelFont=10:333333:true" \
  --prop legend=right \
  --prop "legendfont=9:6B7280:Arial" \
  --prop chartFill=FAFBFC \
  --prop "series.outline=FFFFFF-1" \
  --prop x=0 --prop y=0 --prop width=12 --prop height=18

HTML preview support

Feature Preview Notes
2D pie slices Yes SVG arc paths
Per-slice colors Yes From theme or custom
Data labels (%, value) Yes Suppressed for slices <5%
3D pie Yes Ellipse distortion with depth
Explosion No Stored in OOXML but not rendered
Title styling Yes Font, size, color, bold
Legend positioning Yes Top, bottom, left, right
Plot/chart fills Yes Solid and gradient
Shadow effects No Decorative; not rendered
Glow effects No Decorative; not rendered

Known quirks

  • Single series only. Pie charts take one series; multiple series are not supported.
  • varyColors is always true. Automatically set so each slice gets its own color from the palette.
  • No axes or gridlines. Pie charts do not have category or value axes. Properties like axisMin, gridlines, referenceLine, and marker are not applicable.
  • 3D pie falls back to simplified rendering in preview. pie3d is rendered with ellipse distortion but without full 3D lighting. Use Excel for 3D QA.

Inspect an existing pie chart

# List all charts
officecli query charts-pie.xlsx chart

# Inspect a specific chart
officecli get charts-pie.xlsx "/Sheet1/chart[1]"

# Render to HTML preview
officecli view charts-pie.xlsx html > preview.html

See Also

Based on OfficeCLI v1.0.64

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