How to Create a Story in Tableau

A Story in Tableau is a sequence of visualizations (Worksheets or Dashboards) that work together to convey a message. For example, you can create a Tableau story to tell: why a particular product is not performing well, why we are getting negative profits in the highest sales region, why sales are not improving with a previous management decision, etc.

In this article, we will show you how to create a Story in Tableau with an example. For this example, we are going to use the Area Chart, Stacked Bar Charts, and other charts created in this series of articles. Please refer to the Dashboards, Area Chart, Bar Chart, Maps, and Other Chars article.

Create a Tableau Story Example

Please click on the New Story tab at the end to create a Story. Now you can see the Tableau Storyboard to explain a story.

1. Blank: Use this button to create a new Story Point.
2. Duplicate: Use this button to Duplicate the existing point
3. Sheets: List of Worksheets Sheets that are available to create this.
4. Drag to Add Text: This will help you to add Custom Text on Top.
5. Show Title: Checkmark this option to display the Title; otherwise, uncheck this property.
6. Size: Use this property to adjust the display size.
7. Add a Caption: Use this Tableau Area to explain the Story Point
8. It is the actual work area.
9. Name of the Storyboard. Right-click and select the Rename Sheet option context menu to rename.

Hover over any sheet to see the sheet preview and click the marked button. It will take you to the original sheet.

Let me Drag and Drop the Google Map sheet to the Tableau Story Point. Now you can see the map. Let me use the Add caption to write a Caption.

We have written some sample Texts as a Case Study. If you observe the below screenshot, 4 buttons are displayed on top of the caption box. They are:

1. Delete: To delete the current one
2. Revert: Use this to undo the changes.
3. Update: To update the caption
4. Save a New: This will save the caption as a New StoryPoint.

Create a New Story Point

Click on the Blank button to add a New story point in Tableau. And you can see the new Tableau story point has been added with Add Caption.

As you can see from the below screenshot, we added the Line Chart to this story point. We also added some sample text as the caption.

Duplicate Story Point of a Tableau

The desktop allows you to duplicate the existing story point. To do so, click on the Duplicate button to duplicate the Desktop will make a copy of the current one.

Now, you can see the duplicated story point.

Add Text to a Tableau Story

Drag and drop the Drag to Add Text Object to the work area to add custom text or Description to the Story Point. Once you drop the Drag to Add Text Object onto the work area, a new pop-up window called Edit Description will open. Use this window to write your description.

Now you can see the newly added text to it in the following image.

Display Size of a Tableau Story

By default Fixed-size with Story, Size option is selected by Tableau. Under the Size, you can change the size from Fixed to Automatic or Range as per your requirement. It can be helpful to design your story based on Size. The automatic option will adjust the point as per the Screen size.

Under the Fixed option, we have multiple options to select. Let me choose the Web Page Embedded for now.

Format Tableau Story Layout

The layout tab is used to format the captions of a Story.

1. Caption Box: This is the default option. Use this option to display the caption.
2. Numbers: Use this option to display the numbers (1, 2, 3,…) instead of a caption.
3. Dots: Use this option to display Dots
4. Show arrows: Checkmark this option to display the arrows around the captions; otherwise, uncheck this property.

Let me select the Numbers option for demonstration purposes.

Remove a Story Point from the Desktop

By simply clicking the Delete button, you can delete the caption along with the story point from the current Tableau story. Please click that marked button to successfully delete a story point.