Arduino - draw charts by using Serial Plotter

Serial Plotter is a very useful feature of Arduino IDE for drawing linear charts. This post contains two examples that explain how to use it.

1. Simple example - zigzag line

A very simple example where variable y is increased from 0 to 10 by adding 1 in each iteration. If the value reaches 10, the y variable is back to 0.

Step 1. Write code below and upload a compiled program to Arduino (Sketch -> Upload).

Note: For single chart every value has to be printed in a new line (use: Serial.println() instead of Serial.print()).

int y = 0;

void setup() {
  // enable serial communication between Arduino and PC
  Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
  y += 1;
  if(y > 10) y = 0;
  
  Serial.println(y);

  // wait 10 ms
  delay(10);
}

Step 2. Open Serial Plotter (Tools -> Serial Plotter). In the new window you will see a similar chart:

2. Three charts example

There is a possibility to draw more than only one chart at the same time. The example code bellow drawing three charts: zigzag line (y1), straight line (y2) and sinus function (y3).

Note: For three charts, three values have to be printed in a single line. Values in line have to be separated by space or tab.

Step 1. Write code below and upload a compiled program to Arduino (Sketch -> Upload).

int y1 = 0, y2 = 15;
double x3 = 0.0, y3;

void setup() {
  // enable serial communication between Arduino and PC
  Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
  y1 += 1;
  if(y1 > 10) y1 = 0;

  y3 = sin(x3) -10.0;
  x3 += 0.1;

  Serial.print(y1); Serial.print("\t");
  Serial.print(y2); Serial.print("\t");
  Serial.println(y3);
  
  // wait 10 ms
  delay(10);
}

Step 2. Open Serial Plotter (Tools -> Serial Plotter). In the new window you will see a three charts: