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Tableau | Data visualisation

Dashed & Dotted Lines in Tableau | Line Patterns - New in tableau 2023.2

After 11 years on the ideas page, Tableau 2023.2 finally lets you draw dashed and dotted lines.

Tim Ngwena •16 June 2023 •2 min read •3 min watch •6K

Part ofWhat's new in Tableau 2023.2

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Tableau 2023.2 adds dashed and dotted line patterns alongside the original solid line, accessed through the Path property on the Marks card
Applying the pattern on the 'All' section changes every line, while selecting an individual pill lets you set patterns independently
Line patterns are especially useful on dual-axis charts to distinguish things like a forecast or modelled variant from actual values
This feature finally delivers an 11-year-old Tableau community idea that had accumulated over 4,000 points
Tim's wish-list addition: the ability to add line patterns as labelled legend items, since legends currently only communicate colour

0:00In Tableau 23.2 you can now do this, go to

0:03path for any line and you'll now see we

0:05have two new

0:06line patterns, we had solid before but now

0:09we have dashed and dusted and when you

0:10click on them it

0:11changes the line. This is great as ever let

0:14's get stuck in. Now I feel it's only right

0:16we start here

0:17in the Tableau community ideas page. This

0:21idea is 11 years old and it's been marked

0:24as under

0:24construction and here we are in 23.2 and it

0:27's been finally delivered. There are so many

0:29other

0:30duplicate ideas it's got 4,000 points and

0:32we're just so glad to have it in the

0:34product. It's

0:35a shame it's taken a long time but it's

0:37great that Tableau is listening it's

0:39starting to go

0:40into this list and pick off the let's say

0:42low hanging fruit and deliver them as

0:44features.

0:45It's really going to give people I guess a

0:47little bit more flexibility in the way they

0:48build their

0:49charts but let's head back to the feature.

0:51I've already shown you this it's literally

0:53as simple

0:54as I shady so there's not much of a video

0:56here but I will show you this. If you do it

0:59on the all

1:00section it obviously changes both lines if

1:02you go to each individual pill that's on

1:04your marks pen

1:05you can of course change them independently

1:07and you can of course do the coloring as

1:09you would.

1:10Where this is going to have I think the

1:12most impact is if you sort of dual axis

1:15a line and you've got lots of things going

1:17on maybe you've got a modeled variant or

1:19maybe you've

1:20got some sort of forecast going on it's

1:22going to be useful to have that option of

1:24using dashed or

1:24dotted to convey certain things. The thing

1:27that I would love the most is that when we

1:30have this sort

1:31of desegregation with paths and you have

1:34lines dotted and solid I feel like we now

1:37need the

1:38ability to have these as legend items. We

1:41currently have color and at the moment

1:43color can communicate

1:44the legend over here on the top right hand

1:46side but actually I think now that we have

1:48these in

1:49most chart visualization in most sort of

1:52good best practice you typically do have a

1:55legend that

1:56explains what's the difference between a

1:58solid dash and a dotted line and it would

2:00just be nice

2:00to have a text field that we can enter here

2:03and then that automatically appears in the

2:05legend that

2:05would be a really nice way of communicating

2:08it on a chart or sheet by sheet basis if

2:10that's say so.

2:11So anyway that's pretty much the feature in

2:13a nutshell 23.2 is out I already have a

2:15playlist

2:15you're watching a video in that playlist

2:17right now check the description to see the

2:19rest of the

2:19videos and we are super close to 50 000

2:22subscribers if we can do that by the end of

2:25the weekend I

2:25would be so so happy so if you know anyone

2:28who's not subscribed share the word please

2:30help me reach

2:31that goal and I'll catch you in the next

2:33one.

2:33you

2:43[ Silence ]

Rollup

Tableau 2023.2 adds dashed and dotted line patterns as a native option on the Path mark, letting you visually distinguish line types without relying on colour alone.

Previously Tableau only supported solid lines. This feature had sat on the Tableau community ideas page for 11 years before being delivered in 2023.2.

The Breakdown

Find the new patterns on Path 0:00

For any line mark, open the Path property on the Marks card and you'll now see dashed and dotted options alongside the original solid line. Clicking a pattern applies it directly to the line.
Apply to all lines at once 1:00

If you set the pattern on the 'All' section of the Marks card, it changes every line in the view in one go.
Set patterns independently per pill 1:06

If you instead apply the pattern to an individual pill, you can give different lines different patterns (and colours) independently of each other — useful once you've broken a view out by category.
Best used on dual-axis charts 1:08

The pattern option has most impact when you dual-axis two lines, for example to show a forecast or modelled variant against actual values — the dash/dot pattern makes the distinction obvious without needing colour to do all the work.

Worth Knowing

There's no built-in way to show the line pattern as a labelled legend item — legends currently only communicate colour, not pattern, so you'd need another way to explain what dashed vs dotted means on the chart.

Use It When

Reach for this whenever you're charting two related lines — like actuals vs. forecast or a modelled variant — and want a visual cue beyond colour to tell them apart.

How this Rollup was made provenance & method

A Rollup is drafted by AI from the video's transcript, then reviewed and edited by Tim. Everything used to produce this one is listed below — the model, the exact prompt, and the source video — so the process is transparent and reproducible.

Transcription: On-device — NVIDIA Parakeet v3 for recent videos, OpenAI Whisper large-v3 for earlier ones. The transcript never leaves the machine or gets published.
Drafting: Claude Sonnet 5 in the cloud, from that transcript.
Prompt: The exact Rollup prompt (v2) — the full system prompt, unedited.
Source video: Watch on YouTube
Drafted: 5 July 2026 at 09:38
Reviewed & edited: 5 July 2026 at 09:41 · by Tim Ngwena

Model + prompt + video is everything you'd need to recreate a Rollup like this yourself. The one thing we don't share is the transcript.

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