To illustrate the trend of customer visits over several months, which chart type is most effective?

Using a line chart is particularly effective for illustrating trends over time, such as customer visits over several months. The primary reason for this is that a line chart connects individual data points with straight lines, which clearly showcases the movement or trend in the data.

In this case, the x-axis typically represents time (months, in this example), while the y-axis represents the number of customer visits. This setup allows viewers to easily track changes month to month, helping to identify patterns, peaks, and troughs in customer visits over the selected time period.

While bar charts can also represent data over time, they imply a comparison between distinct categories rather than highlighting trends. Pie charts are used for showing proportions of a whole and are not suitable for trend analysis over time. Stacked area charts could show cumulative totals, but they can complicate the understanding of individual trends due to overlapping areas.

Thus, the line chart stands out as the most effective choice for this scenario, providing a clear and intuitive view of how customer visits change over time.