How to Assign Individual Colors to Bars

RadChart has been replaced by RadHtmlChart, Telerik's client-side charting component. If you are considering RadChart for new development, examine the RadHtmlChart documentation and online demos first to see if it will fit your development needs. If you are already using RadChart in your projects, you can migrate to RadHtmlChart by following these articles: Migrating Series, Migrating Axes, Migrating Date Axes, Migrating Databinding, Features parity. Support for RadChart is discontinued as of Q3 2014, but the control will remain in the assembly so it can still be used. We encourage you to use RadHtmlChart for new development.

"I need each bar in a bar chart to be a different color. How do I do this?"

By default RadChart is designed so that all bars from a series have the same colors. If you need each to have a different color, loop through each chart series item and assign them a color from an array. This should be done after binding the chart, so the chart series items are available.

protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
   Color[] barColors = new Color[8]{
       Color.Purple,
       Color.SteelBlue,
       Color.Aqua,
       Color.Yellow,
       Color.Navy,
       Color.Green,
       Color.Blue,
       Color.Red
   };
    if (!IsPostBack)
    {
        int i = 0;
        RadChart1.DataSourceID = "SqlDataSource1";
        RadChart1.DataBind();
        RadChart1.Series[0].Name = "Units by Category";
        foreach (ChartSeriesItem item in RadChart1.Series[0].Items)
        {
            item.Appearance.FillStyle.MainColor = barColors[i++];
        }
    }
}

Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)
    Dim barColors As Color() = New Color(8) {Color.Purple, Color.SteelBlue, Color.Aqua, Color.Yellow, Color.Navy, Color.Green, _
     Color.Blue, Color.Red}
    If Not IsPostBack Then
        Dim i As Integer = 0
        RadChart1.DataSourceID = "SqlDataSource1"
        RadChart1.DataBind()
        RadChart1.Series(0).Name = "Units by Category"
        For Each item As ChartSeriesItem In RadChart1.Series(0).Items
            item.Appearance.FillStyle.MainColor = barColors(System.Math.Max(System.Threading.Interlocked.Increment(i), i - 1))
        Next
    End If
End Sub