Moving and Resizing Chart Elements

You can use the mouse to resize the outer frame and to move and resize data frames and legend frames. You can also move and resize text boxes, but not other frames with text in them (such as annotations and axis labels). In addition, you can use the Chart Size tab on the Properties window to enter exact dimensions for the outer frame.

How to Move and Resize elements

  1. Select the chart element you want to move or resize.
  2. To move the element with the mouse. Position the mouse cursor over the element's border. When a four-headed arrow appears, click and drag the element to a new location.
  3. To move the element with the keyboard. Use the arrow keys to move the element in small increments vertically or horizontally.
  4. To resize the element. Position the mouse cursor over a resizing handle on the element's border. When a two-headed arrow appears, click and drag the resizing handle until the element is the right size. You can also resize the outer frame by using the Chart Size tab.

Tip

To maintain the aspect ratio (the ratio of width to height), click one of the corner resizing handles and hold down the Shift key while dragging.

How To Resize the Outer Frame with the Properties Window

You can also resize the outer frame by entering exact dimensions in the Properties window.

  1. From the menus choose,

    Edit > Properties

  2. Use Chart Size tab of the Properties window to specify options for resizing the outer frame:
  3. Click Apply.

Using the Chart Size Tab

Height/Width. Enter the height and width for the chart (outer frame). The measurement unit comes from the setting on the General tab of the Options dialog box (Edit menu in the Viewer). Experiment to get the size that works best for your chart. If you make the chart too small, elements can overlap. Also note that resizing the outer frame resizes other chart elements such as the data frame and legend frame.

Maintain aspect ratio. Enforce the same ratio of chart width to chart height. When Maintain aspect ratio is selected, the dimension that you enter automatically updates the other dimension so that the ratio is preserved.

Resize elements when new elements are added/removed. Let the Chart Editor automatically resize items in the chart when other items are added or removed. See the topic Controlling White Space for more information.