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Ten of the Best Data Visualizations Created In 2020

#3. Coronavirus Deaths vs Other Epidemics Bar Chart Race

Arrow vector created by macrovector - www.freepik.com
Arrow vector created by macrovector – www.freepik.com

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If there’s one thing I know for sure, EVERYONE loves data visualizations, even if they don’t necessarily like data. Think about how popular Spotify’s 2019 Wrapped was to give an example.

Wasting no time, I wanted to share with you the ten most fascinating data visualizations that I saw this year and why they’re so engaging.

By reading this article, you’ll also learn about a bunch of new visualizations, like choropleth maps, bar chart races, and Sankey diagrams!

Let’s dive into it.


1. Trending Google Searches by State

Arguably the coolest data visualization this year is this Choropleth Map of Trending Google Searches by State Between 2018 and 2020.

A choropleth map is a type of thematic map where areas or regions are shaded in proportion to a given data variable. In this case, top search words are being compared by state over time. If you’ve followed my articles, you’ll know that I love choropleth maps because of their ability to communicate a lot of information at once.

Some interesting things that I learned are:

  • How unanimous the US is when it comes to search patterns. For the most part, the trending search term is the same across the whole country at any given point.
  • How most of the search terms are related to celebrities, TV shows, and movies, especially BILLIE EILISH.
  • How little "Coronavirus" was searched in 2020. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised considering their number of cases.

If you want to learn how to build dynamic choropleth maps, check out my tutorial here!


2. "Light speed is fast, but space is vast"

Animations aren’t the easiest things to make, but they work extremely well when trying to demonstrate incomprehensible things like light speed!

This animation shows you how fast a light pulse moves relative to the space that is shown.

I like this visualization because it really puts the idea of light speed into perspective, but more importantly, it puts the idea of how big space is into perspective.


3. Coronavirus Deaths vs Other Epidemics

This visualization shows the numbers of deaths caused by the coronavirus and other epidemics from the day of the first death.

This type of visualization is called a bar chart race – I’m sure you’ve seen many of these all over the internet this year, like the richest people over time, the largest countries by GDP, most popular artists, etc…

If you think about it, this visualization essentially communicates the exact same thing as a line graph, but it’s way more engaging in the sense that you get to learn about the historical timeline of the given topic.

Want to build one yourself, check out this tutorial here.


4. 3-D Map of COVID Case Over Time

Yes, it’s another COVID visualization, BUT this one is quite unique! This is a 3D map of COVID-19 cases in the United States over time. It’s similar to a choropleth map but amplifies the severity of the spread of the virus with its 3D bars.

Terrifying isn’t it?


5. US $2T Stimulus Bill

This visualization shows how the $2 Trillion Stimulus Bill in the US is being allocated.

In case you didn’t know, this data visualization is called a Sankey Diagram and it has blown up in popularity over the past year. It kind of serves the same purpose as treemaps in the sense that it breaks the allocation into groups and subgroups, and it represents values in proportions.

Check out Plotly’s tutorial on building Sankey diagrams here.


6. Most Frequent NBA Shots

I love data visualizations that teach you a bit of history and this is certainly one of them. This visualization shows the most frequent NBA shots in different years.

The most interesting thing to notice is how much more prevalent 3 point shots have become over the years! What else do you find interesting about this? Let me know in the comments.


7. US GDP vs National Debt

Sometimes, a simple line chart is all you need to get a message across. This visualization shows the timeline of US GDP and national debt side by side.


8. Satellites Orbiting Earth

This visualization is a timelapse of all of the satellites orbiting Earth. I included this one because I think it does a fantastic job communicating the number of satellites that orbit our atmosphere! It makes you wonder how many of the stars you see are actually "stars".

Image Created by thesavv
Image Created by thesavv

_See here for timelapse._

Something really cool to point out is that you can see the Starlink satellites in this timelapse!


9. Death as a Percent of the World Population for Various Pandemics.

If you want to get a better idea of how deadly COVID-19 is compared to other viruses, this is one of the best visualizations out there. Normally, I’m not a fan of 3-D visualizations, but this one does such a good job at communicating information.


10. Coronavirus Case Dashboard

The last visualization that I wanted to share is actually a dashboard. This dashboard is created by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at John Hopkins University. It’s arguably the most comprehensive and interactive dashboard I’ve seen for the coronavirus.

Image from John Hopkins University
Image from John Hopkins University

Thanks for Reading!

If you enjoyed this, be sure to subscribe to never miss another article on data science guides, tricks and tips, life lessons, and more!

I hope you had as much fun reading this as I did writing this! Hopefully, you learned a couple of things, like new data visualization techniques or what makes a good visualization. Let me know what your favorite data visualization from 2020 is in the comments.

Not sure what to read next? I’ve picked another article for you:

All Machine Learning Algorithms You Should Know in 2021

Terence Shin


Note from the editors: Towards Data Science is a Medium publication primarily based on the study of data science and machine learning. We are not health professionals or epidemiologists, and the opinions of this article should not be interpreted as professional advice. See our Reader Terms for details. To learn about the coronavirus pandemic, you can click here.


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