
iOS & macOS Charting Documentation - SciChart iOS & macOS Charts SDK v4.x
Axis APIs - Value Axis vs. Category Axis
SciChart 2D iOS Features several axis types which could be Value or Category. All inherit from SCIAxisBase
.
So what’s the difference between Value and Category Axes? An explanation is given below.
Given the data:
Age (X-Axis) | Cats | Dogs | Fish |
---|---|---|---|
1 | 7 | 7 | 8 |
9 | 6 | 5 | 7 |
10 | 5 | 4 | 3 |
20 | 4 | 3 | 2 |
A Value X-Axis and Category X-Axis would display the data differently:
Category X-Axis | Value X-Axis |
---|---|
![]() |
![]() |
The fundamental difference is a Value-Axis uses the X-Value to compute distance on the XAxis, whereas a Category-Axis uses the X-Index. Value-Axis are primarily used in scientific software where Category–Axis are typically used in financial software (e.g. stock charts).
SciChart features both Value-Axis and Category-Axis types.
Axis Type | Value or Category Axis |
---|---|
SCINumericAxis | Value Axis |
SCILogarithmicNumericAxis | Value Axis |
SCIDateAxis | Value Axis |
SCICategoryDateAxis | Category Axis |
For more information, refer to the Axis APIs article.