Create an interactive waterfall chart. — waterfall

A waterfall chart shows how an initial value is built up or eroded by a series of positive and negative contributions to reach a final total. Each bar starts exactly where the previous one ended, making cumulative effects immediately visible. It is the standard chart for P&L decomposition, budget variance analysis, and any "what changed and why" narrative.

Hovering over a bar shows a tooltip with the label, the delta value, and the running total at that point.

waterfall_chart(
  data,
  x,
  y,
  measure = NULL,
  positiveColor = "#4CAF50",
  negativeColor = "#F44336",
  totalColor = "#5C85D6",
  connector = TRUE,
  connectorColor = "#aaaaaa",
  showLabels = TRUE,
  labelFontSize = 10,
  title = NULL,
  titleFontSize = 16,
  xtitle = NULL,
  xtitleFontSize = 13,
  ytitle = NULL,
  ytitleFontSize = 13,
  xFontSize = 11,
  yFontSize = 11,
  opacity = 1,
  font = "Verdana, Geneva, Tahoma, sans-serif",
  bgcol = "white",
  axisCol = "black",
  width = NULL,
  height = NULL
)

Arguments

data: The data frame containing the variables to consider.
x: The name of the column containing category labels.
y: The name of the column containing the delta values (positive for increases, negative for decreases).
measure: Optional. The name of a column that classifies each row as "relative" (default — a delta added to the running total) or "total" (a bar spanning from zero to the current running total, used for subtotals and the final total).
positiveColor: Fill color for bars representing an increase. Defaults to "#4CAF50".
negativeColor: Fill color for bars representing a decrease. Defaults to "#F44336".
totalColor: Fill color for "total" measure bars. Defaults to "#5C85D6".
connector: Logical. Whether to draw dashed connector lines between consecutive bars. Defaults to TRUE.
connectorColor: Color of the connector lines. Defaults to "#aaaaaa".
showLabels: Logical. Whether to display the delta value above or below each bar. Defaults to TRUE.
labelFontSize: Font size of the bar value labels. Defaults to 10.
title: Optional. Title of the chart.
titleFontSize: Font size of the chart title. Defaults to 16.
xtitle: Optional. Title of the x-axis.
xtitleFontSize: Font size of the x-axis title. Defaults to 13.
ytitle: Optional. Title of the y-axis.
ytitleFontSize: Font size of the y-axis title. Defaults to 13.
xFontSize: Font size of the x-axis tick labels. Defaults to 11.
yFontSize: Font size of the y-axis tick labels. Defaults to 11.
opacity: Opacity of the bars (0 to 1). Defaults to 1.
font: The font family used for all text. Defaults to "Verdana, Geneva, Tahoma, sans-serif".
bgcol: Background color of the SVG. Defaults to "white".
axisCol: Color of axis lines, ticks, and labels. Defaults to "black".
width: Optional. The width of the SVG output.
height: Optional. The height of the SVG output.

Value

An interactive SVG waterfall chart.

Examples

# P&L bridge: from revenue down to net income
pnl <- data.frame(
  label   = c("Revenue", "COGS", "Gross Profit",
              "R&D", "S&M", "G&A", "Operating Income"),
  value   = c(1200, -450, 750, -120, -90, -60, 480),
  measure = c("relative", "relative", "total",
              "relative", "relative", "relative", "total")
)

waterfall_chart(
  data    = pnl,
  x       = "label",
  y       = "value",
  measure = "measure",
  title   = "P&L bridge",
  ytitle  = "USD thousands"
)


# Monthly cash flow
cashflow <- data.frame(
  month = c("Jan", "Feb", "Mar", "Apr", "May", "Jun"),
  delta = c(120, -30, 80, -60, 95, -20)
)

waterfall_chart(
  data           = cashflow,
  x              = "month",
  y              = "delta",
  title          = "Monthly cash flow",
  ytitle         = "USD thousands",
  positiveColor  = "steelblue",
  negativeColor  = "tomato"
)