How to make a Gantt chart in Google Sheets

This Gantt Chart Google Sheets article will show you how to create a Gantt Chart from your Google spreadsheet.

Why use project management visuals

A Gantt chart is a critical project management tool for anyone working on a project. Gantt charts help visualize the project schedule and status, which makes them useful particularly when communicating with project stakeholders.

There is a lot of Gantt chart software available to manage projects, but these tools create complex schedules that are often too confusing for executive reporting or client reviews.

Google spreadsheets are easily editable and accessible from the cloud, which makes them useful for collaborating on projects. Although there is no native Google apps solution for project management, Google Sheets is perfectly suitable for tracking project schedules. When it comes to presenting those schedules to customers or management, you will need to learn how to create a Gantt chart.

Below we will demonstrate how to manually create a simple Gantt chart in Google Sheets. If you wish to create more professional visuals for high-level presentations, we will show you how to instantly turn your data into a beautiful Gantt chart using a free online Gantt chart tool called Office Timeline Online.

Which tutorial would you like to see?

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How to manually make a Gantt chart in Google Sheets

1. Organize schedule data in a table.

Set up your Google project management spreadsheet by building a table for your project schedule. As shown below, it should include the description of your tasks or phases and the start and finish date for each of them.

2. Add task duration table.

Add a second table underneath. The purpose of this table will be to calculate the intervals in days (duration) between the start date and the finish date. These intervals will be used to build your Gantt chart. The 3 columns in this table will reflect the 3 columns in your original table. Set it up like this:

1. The first column will be your task descriptions copied exactly from your original table. In our new table, we called them “Tasks”. To copy them from your original project schedule with a formula, in the first cell of your new table type “=” and then click on the cell with the title of your project description in the original table. You can repeat or simply drag the corner of this cell downward and your formula will be copied for each of your task descriptions.

2. We called our second column “Start on day.” Basically, this column figures out the day into the project each of your tasks will begin on. So, the first/earliest task will obviously start on day 0. To calculate this column, use the following Google spreadsheet formula as shown below: =int(E5)-int($E$5) and in the cell beneath =int(E6)-int($E$5). This formula translates into: This Task's Start Date – The First Task's Start Date (in our example, cell B5). See more Google Sheets formulas to choose the one that best suits your project data.

   

3. We called our third column “Task duration (days)”. In this column, Google Sheets figures out how many days each of your project's tasks will go on for. In our example, the first task, Sourcing, will last for 77 days. Calculate this for each of your tasks using this Google spreadsheet formula as shown below: =(int(F5)-int($E$5))-(int(E5)-int($E$5)) and in the cell beneath =(int(F6)-int($E$5))-(int(E6)-int($E$5)). This formula translates into: (This task’s End Date – The first task’s Start Date) – (This task’s Start Date – The first task’s Start Date) = Task duration.

   

3. Insert a Stacked bar chart.

Click in the corner of your new table and select all the data in it. Navigate to Insert on the Google Sheets ribbon and select Chart from the drop-down menu. Google Sheets automatically inserts the Stacked bar chart type of chart, which is exactly what we need here.

4. Change chart bar appearance.

Now, double-click on any of the "Start on day" bars on your chart (the blue ones, in our case). This will open the Series section in the Chart editor menu. Open the drop-down under Fill opacity by clicking the arrow next to “100%” and select “0%”.

5. Customize your Gantt chart.

Once you have created your chart, you can customize any items as you like. For instance, you can rename the chart, change or add horizontal and vertical axis titles, and make other customizations by right-clicking anywhere on the graphic and accessing Chart editor. To change the bar color, double-click on any of the "Task duration (days)" bars (the red ones, in our case). This will open the Series section in the Chart editor menu. Open the drop-down under Fill color by clicking the arrow next to “Auto” and select the color you want to use.

And here’s how our Google Sheets Gantt chart looks like after some customization (removed the chart title, added a title to the horizontal axis and changed the vertical axis title):