Retool Chart Component v2: New Features & How to Use It

If you've ever tried to build a custom chart in Retool using raw Plotly JSON, you know the pain. The old Chart component was powerful in theory but brutally unfriendly in practice — especially for non-developers on your team who just needed a bar chart without a PhD in Plotly's schema. The Retool chart component v2 changes all of that. Retool has officially rolled out a fully redesigned chart component with a visual GUI editor, 10 new chart type presets, improved performance, and native Theming support — and it's now enabled for all cloud organizations with no action required.

What Was Wrong With the Old Retool Chart Component?

The original Chart component in Retool was built on top of Plotly.js, which meant that any meaningful customization required writing or modifying Plotly JSON directly. For developers comfortable with Plotly's API, this was workable — but it created a hard ceiling for non-technical users and slowed down even experienced builders. Three problems came up constantly in the Retool community:

• Plotly JSON complexity — Even simple customizations required hunting through Plotly docs and hand-editing nested JSON objects.
• No Theming integration — Charts sat visually outside the rest of your app because they couldn't inherit your organization's theme colors and styles.
• Limited chart type defaults — Getting beyond basic line and bar charts meant writing custom configurations from scratch.

These weren't edge cases. They were blockers that made charts one of the most frustrating components to work with in Retool.

What's New in Retool Chart Component v2

The v2 Chart component is a ground-up rebuild. Here's what ships with it:

• GUI editor — A completely transformed visual editor replaces raw Plotly JSON configuration. You can now set axes, colors, labels, and series without touching JSON at all.
• 10 new chart type presets — Out-of-the-box support for more chart types means less custom configuration. Common chart types like scatter, area, histogram, and more are now first-class presets. (Community members have already flagged that a gauge chart would be a welcome addition for sales and financial dashboards — worth watching for in future releases.)
• Theming support — The new component integrates directly with Retool's Theming system, so your charts will automatically inherit your app's color palette and typography settings.
• Improved performance — Rendering is faster, especially for larger datasets, which matters when you're building real-time dashboards or high-frequency reporting tools.
• Backwards compatibility — Enabling v2 does not affect your existing apps or charts. Your current Chart components will continue to work exactly as before.

How to Start Using Retool Chart Component v2

If your organization is on Retool Cloud, the new chart component is already available — no feature flag, no form, no waiting. Here's how to get up and running:

• Step 1: Open any existing Retool app or create a new one in the editor.
• Step 2: In the component panel, search for Chart. The v2 component will be available by default.
• Step 3: Drag the Chart component onto your canvas.
• Step 4: In the right-hand panel, use the new GUI editor to select your chart type from the preset list (bar, line, scatter, area, histogram, and more).
• Step 5: Connect your data source by pointing the chart's data property to a query result — for example, {{ getRevenueData.data }}.
• Step 6: Map your X and Y axes using the dropdown selectors in the GUI editor. No JSON required.
• Step 7: Apply your organization theme via the Theming panel and watch your chart inherit the correct colors automatically.

If you need to drop into advanced configuration, the underlying Plotly JSON editor is still accessible — so power users aren't locked out of low-level customization when they need it.

Who Benefits Most From This Update?

The v2 chart component is a win across the board, but it's especially impactful in two scenarios. First, if your Retool apps are used or maintained by non-developers — ops managers, analysts, or business users — the GUI editor means they can now adjust chart configurations without filing a ticket with your dev team. Second, if you're building client-facing internal tools where visual consistency matters, Theming integration means your charts will finally look like they belong in the same app as the rest of your components.

Will This Break My Existing Charts?

No. Retool has confirmed that enabling v2 does not affect any existing apps or Chart components. Your old charts using Plotly JSON configurations will continue to render exactly as they do today. You can adopt v2 incrementally — replacing charts one at a time as you rebuild or update your apps — without any risk to production tools.

Bottom Line

The Retool chart component v2 is one of the most developer-experience-focused updates Retool has shipped in a while. It removes the single biggest complaint about the old Chart component — Plotly JSON configuration — and replaces it with a GUI that actually matches how people think about building charts. If you've been avoiding charts in your Retool apps because they were too painful to customize, now is the time to revisit them. The component is live on all cloud organizations today.