Introduction
AG Charts is an open-source JavaScript charting and graphing library from the makers of AG Grid built for React, Angular and Vue. Last week saw the release of AG Charts 9, and, most notably, the introduction of AG Charts Enterprise.
Read on to learn a bit more about the background of AG Charts, how we arrived where we are today, and what you can expect from our brand-new enterprise product 👇
History of AG Charts
AG Charts was built by the AG Grid team in 2019 as a way to power integrated charts in AG Grid - a feature that lets users build charts directly from AG Grid. Sticking to our roots as an open-source company, we released AG Charts as a completely free and stand-alone open-source library. We knew that we had built a great library in its own right, so why not share it? Since then, AG Charts has steadily grown in popularity, now amassing over 300,000 NPM downloads/month (as of 04/12/2023). With this rise in popularity, we decided it was time to invest further in AG Charts which has now culminated in the release of AG Charts 9 and the introduction of AG Charts Enterprise.
Why AG Charts?
At this point, you may be thinking: "Why another charting library?" or "Why should I use AG Charts?". Our response would be that AG Charts comes with the same performance and reliability our users have come to expect of AG Grid. This reputation, and the subsequent trust we've earned with grid developers, has consistently separated us from our competition. We're confident we can earn that same reputation and trust from Charts developers, too.
Enterprise vs. Community
The obvious next question is, what's the difference between the Enterprise and Community versions of AG Charts? Well, in a nutshell:
- AG Charts Community is the original version of AG Charts that is designed to meet most use cases and is free forever.
- AG Charts Enterprise is an advanced version of AG Charts, with more series types, features, and dedicated Zendesk support, designed for enterprise use cases and customers.
Let's take a closer look at the series types & features available in AG Charts Enterprise:
Enterprise Series Types
AG Charts Enterprise comes with 13 additional series types - Box Plot, Bullet, Heatmap, Range Area, Range Bar, Radar Area, Radar Line, Radial Bar, Radial Column, Nightingale, Sunburst, Treemap, Waterfall:
See the gallery for a full list of series types & examples.
Enterprise Features
In addition to enhanced series types, AG Charts Enterprise also comes with a range of new features:
- Animation of the graph or chart on load or update
- Context Menu for additional actions, such as zooming, downloading or whatever else your users may need
- Crosshairs for precise analysis of complex graphs
- Zoom into and out of data
- Error Bars for showing confidence intervals within data
- Background Images to brand and style the chart
Check out the animation below that demonstrates some of these features:
Framework Support
AG Charts Community and Enterprise have both been built specifically for React, Angular, and Vue meaning you can build React Charts as easily as you can build JavaScript charts. These aren't just wrappers, either; we've built the library specifically for these frameworks.
Testing and Upgrading
It's free to try out AG Charts Enterprise and you do not need to contact us at all; we just ask that you don't use AG Charts Enterprise in a project intended for production without a licence.
When testing without a valid license key installed, your console log will will show a watermark for 5 seconds and display a series of warnings:
If you would like to remove this watermark or access support via Zendesk, you will need a trial license. Please email info@ag-grid.com to request a trial license key.
Pricing
AG Charts Enterprise pricing at $399 / developer, but there is a limited-time launch price of $199 / developer. Check out the pricing page for more information.
TL;DR
- AG Charts was built in 2019 by the AG Grid team to power Integrated Charting within AG Grid.
- Sticking to our roots, we released AG Charts as a free, standalone, open-source library.
- AG Charts proved to be popular with the community, so we decided to release an Enterprise version in December 2023 with new features, series types and dedicated support.
- AG Charts Enterprise requires a license and AG Charts Community will remain free forever
- You can trial AG Charts Enterprise for free - it just displays a watermark and a console warning.
Ready to try it out? Get started with AG Charts Enterprise now 👇