[email protected] +1.303.779.0344

Home How-To

Gantt Chart with Conditional Formatting

Build a Gantt Chart from Microsoft Project and add conditional formatting that automatically assigns colors and shapes to tasks and milestones.

OnePager's powerful conditional formatting engine connects with Microsoft Project and Project Online to build eye-catching Gantt charts like these. Sign up for a free trial and see how it works for your projects.

Gantt Chart from Microsoft Project with OnePager's conditional formatting applied.

Follow these steps to add conditional formatting to your Gantt chart:

  1. Open your Microsoft Project plan. If your project is larger, you can add a filter field like Flag20 to include or exclude details from your Gantt chart:

    Microsoft Project Plan

  2. Go to Microsoft Project's Add-Ins tab and click the OnePager Pro button:

    OnePager Pro is a Gantt Chart add-in for Microsoft Project.

  3. Click NEW to begin building your Gantt Chart:

    OnePager Pro start screen.

  4. Give your Gantt chart a name, and then click the Create New Chart button:

    OnePager Gantt Chart

  5. OnePager will import your selected tasks and milestones from Microsoft Project, and will create an initial Gantt chart that you can start customizing. Initially, OnePager assigns colors based on the phases of your project:

    OnePager Gantt Chart with colors assigned based on the phases of the project.

  6. This is a good start, but if you want to assign colors some other way, this is where OnePager's conditional formatting is really powerful. To turn off the default colors, go to Home > Chart Properties > Task Bars, and set the chart to only Use one color:

    Remove phase-driven color from the Gantt Chart

    When you click OK, the Gantt chart will default to a single gray color:

    Gantt Chart with all tasks the same color.

    The remaining yellow colors in the chart are the progress bars, which are reporting on your Percent Complete information from Microsoft Project.

  7. Return to Home > Chart Properties > Task Bars and click on Manage Rules to launch OnePager's Conditional Formatting rules:

    Launch conditional formatting.

  8. Here a few example rules that assign colors based on status. When a task is late, we'll color it red, and when a task is complete, it can be green. In addition to assigning colors based on status, we can also assign different milestone shapes conditionally. Still looking at the status, we can put a checkmark for completed milestones and an "X" for late milestones:

    Conditional formatting rules assign different colors and shapes based on Microsoft Project data.

    We're using the Status field from Microsoft Project as an example. OnePager's conditional formatting will work with any other field from Microsoft Project or Project Server if you want to use something different.

  9. Click OK, and OnePager will reformat the shapes and colors in your Gantt chart based on the status of your Microsoft Project plan:

    Microsoft Project Gantt Chart with conditional formatting applied based on status (RAG).

OnePager not only creates Gantt charts from Microsoft Project and Project Online, but makes it easy for you to add conditional formatting to your Gantt charts so that you can quickly communicate status and other key project metrics.

Create your own conditionally-formatted Gantt charts today by downloading a free trial of OnePager Pro.

15-Day
Free Trial