LayoutHow does it guide the eye?
Inverted pyramid layout
Stacked by level of detail: the conclusion first, the supporting trend next, the detail last.
Example dashboard
Click a widget to see its data
Sales execution · Q3
Week 37 of 52
Refreshed Monday 06:00Share
Quarter:Q3 FY26Team:All teamsProduct line:AllReset
Bookings QTD
$6.1M
92% of plan
Pipeline coverage
3.1×
target 3.0×
Win rate
27%
−2 pts vs plan
Deals won
184
+12 vs plan
Weekly bookings vs plan
BookingsPlan
Attainment by team
North108%
South97%
West88%
Central81%
Teams behind plan
| Team | Manager | Bookings | Plan | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Central | L. Moreau | $0.94M | $1.16M | −$220k |
| West | R. Okafor | $1.21M | $1.38M | −$170k |
| South | A. Haddad | $1.52M | $1.57M | −$50k |
The data model behind it
Weekly sales and planThe bands map to query depth: the KPIs aggregate everything, the trend groups by week, the table groups by team. Reading down the page is literally reading down the grain of the model.
- Tables read
- 5 of 5
- Joins
- 6
- Fact type
- Periodic snapshot plus a plan fact at the same grain
- Grain
- One row per week, team and product line
- Refresh
- Weekly, Monday 06:00
Widgets
Highlighted: every table this view reads. Pick a widget to isolate its query.
Where it sits in the taxonomy
Organised top to bottom from summary to detail, so reading order is drill order. If all panels carried equal weight it would be a grid; if one visual dominated, single focus.
- Does one visual take most of the page?No
- Do all panels have the same size and weight?No, some matter more
- Is it stacked top to bottom from summary to detail?Yes
- Inverted pyramid layout
At a glance
- Density
- Medium
- First look
- The top band
- Reading order
- Answer, then explanation, then evidence
- Put there
- KPIs on top, trends in the middle, tables at the bottom
Not to be confused with
- Grid layout
- A grid treats every tile as equal. The pyramid ranks content by how much detail it carries.
- F-pattern layout
- F-pattern pages are dense without a deliberate order. The pyramid orders the page on purpose.
How to recognise it
- Full-width bands
- Scrolling moves from the answer to the evidence
- Tables sit at the bottom
Use it for
- Performance and tactical dashboards
- Pages that also have to work on a phone
Avoid it for
- Monitoring walls where everything matters at once