Data Formulator is an open-source, AI-powered data analysis and visualization tool from Microsoft Research. You connect your data, describe what you want to explore, and AI agents transform the data and generate charts interactively, blending natural language with direct manipulation. It has earned over 17,000 stars on GitHub and was actively developed in October 2026.
Traditional charting tools make you reshape data by hand before you can see anything. Data Formulator flips the process: you state an exploration goal, and its AI agents write the transformation code, derive the fields needed, and propose visualizations, which you then refine by dragging, dropping, and asking follow-ups. It connects to files and databases, works with the model providers you configure, and keeps an inspectable trail of how each chart was produced, so results are reproducible rather than magic. A hosted online demo is available, and the full app installs locally with pip.
Data Formulator is completely free and open source under the MIT license, including the local app; the online demo is also free to try.
Data Formulator is for analysts, researchers, journalists, and data-curious professionals who want to explore datasets quickly without writing transformation code for every chart. It shines in early-stage exploration, when questions change faster than dashboards can be rebuilt.