What a kanban board is
A Kanban board groups work items into workflow columns, so the shape of the queue is visible immediately. Where cards pile up is where your bottleneck is — usually a review or approval step rather than the work itself.
When to use one
- Documenting a workflow as it actually runs, for a retrospective or handover
- Presenting a board snapshot in a deck without screenshotting your tracker
- Designing a new workflow before configuring it in a tool
The data format
One card per line: ColumnName, Card text. Cards group by column automatically.
Paste rows like this — copy the example straight into the builder to see it render:
Backlog, Define API schema Backlog, Write onboarding copy In Progress, Build auth flow In Progress, Design dashboard Review, Payment refactor Done, Set up CI pipeline
How to make one
- Paste your data into the Studio, or upload a CSV or XLSX file.
- Set your colours — by hand, from pasted brand hex codes, or extracted from your logo.
- Generate and export as PNG or SVG for your deck or report.
One thing people get wrong. Columns should mirror the real process including the waiting states. A board with only "To do, Doing, Done" hides every queue where time is actually lost.
Why it runs in your browser
Charts are parsed and drawn entirely on your own device. No rows, files or logos are uploaded, so a kanban board built from confidential project or process data never touches a server. You can verify it: open your browser's network tab while you generate one.