MisleadingCharts
All techniques

Cherry-picking

The ever-rising cumulative

A metric that literally cannot go down.

a.k.a. total-to-date · cumulative units sold

Plot “cumulative units sold” and the line rises forever, even while the underlying sales collapse. It is the chart equivalent of only counting up.

How to spot it

  • “Cumulative” or “total to date” anywhere in the label.
  • Growth claims made from a curve that cannot decrease.
  • Flattening is the loudest signal a cumulative chart can send — it means the party stopped.

The honest version

Plot the per-period values. If they look ugly, that is the news.

In the gallery