idea Add customability to the Symbology Histogram in ArcGIS Pro Ideas

Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

MathiasThorp — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 09:05:05 GMT

In the "Classify" tool in ArcMAP, the histogram shows a large amount of bins in the histogram. This way it's easy to get a good overview of the frequency distribution, and thus decide on the classification.

In ArcGIS Pro the number of bins is set at 10 and can't be changed. This makes it very hard to accurately interpret your data and much harder to make a wise decision on the classification.

Would it be possible to either;

- Add as many histogram bins as there are in ArcMAP

- Make the number of bins customizable.

Thank you,

Mathias Thorp,
University of Bergen
Insitute of Geography

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

KoryKramer — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 20:24:59 GMT

Clicking More>Show Statistics will give a quick look to help a little bit...

Just a tip on seeing a full histogram where you can control the number of bins, you can generate a Histogram chart to get a more detailed understanding of the data's distribution:

This also provides the ability to show normal distribution, skewness and kurtosis.

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

MathiasThorp — Sat, 27 Jun 2020 12:16:48 GMT

Hi, Kory.

Thanks for your reply. I am aware of both of these options. The "Show statistics" box have very limited info - that is; several datasets could have exactly the same numbers for mean, median etc and still have very different histograms. E.g. skewness, kurtosis. Natural brake values would still be hidden. Yes - you can create a new histogram from a "Create chart" tool. But you miss the classification brake value arrows underneath, and finding exact values here and put into the Symbology classification would be very difficult and cumbersome.

It would be way more convenient to include more bins in the symbology pane, just like in ArcMap. A "golden number" in statistics and frequency distribution is 30.

All best,

Mathias

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

JeromeHaaland — Tue, 06 Oct 2020 21:22:36 GMT

Making the color scheme match the interval is a nice added feature. But the limited amount of bins is really bad. Miss the customizable number bins a lot.

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

ScottLehto3 — Wed, 11 Aug 2021 20:59:26 GMT

Is it possible to add break values to bins in histograms in Pro? If not, why? This is basic.

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

Craig_Eissler_Iceman — Fri, 15 Jul 2022 23:13:07 GMT

I agree!

I would also like to see an option for matching Bins directly with the Class Ranges, as well as provide a 'Count' for each Class.

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

jhirsch — Mon, 17 Jul 2023 21:27:10 GMT

Just came back from the 2023 UC and I discussed this issue with some nice ESRI folks. The current 10 bins limit make it virtually impossible to see any kind of natural bell curve and see where your break-lines should be. I was told to up-vote the comments here, so here I am...

I like being able generate a large histogram, but you don't see the symbology breaks and are not able to adjust them within the separate histogram.

We need this badly! This is big step down from ArcMap!

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram

PBBennetch_columbus — Tue, 22 Aug 2023 19:55:23 GMT

Agreed, we need to be able to customize the breaks, based on Jenks, quantile, equal interval, etc., just like the symbology pane.

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram - Status changed to: In Product Plan

ZihanSong — Fri, 10 Jan 2025 18:17:19 GMT

Re: Add customability to the Symbology Histogram - Status changed to: Implemented

EdiePunt — Tue, 20 May 2025 21:36:32 GMT

Thank you for this idea. We are happy to report that it has been implemented in ArcGIS Pro 3.5 as follows:

The symbology histogram for class-based symbology includes the following enhancements:

You can change the zoom level.
You can change the bin count to show more or less detail in feature counts.
You can hover over a bin to see the feature count.
Labels are more legible, and keyboard accessibility was improved.

See Use Symbology Histograms for more information.

See the ArcGIS Pro 3.5 Ideas Wrap-up blog for all the ideas we implemented in ArcGIS Pro 3.5.