When there is too much of categories with very less. If you have time, use other data and experiment with buttons and menus to see the wide range of pie charts you can create with Excel. With the formula version the numbers update automatically if you've used a dynamic data range ( = select a single cell from your data and press Ctrl + T to turn it into a table ). When we need to represent the percentage distribution across categories we generally use Pie chart. The pivot table solution is super easy but if the values change you're going to have to refresh the pivot table to get the new values. The COUNTIF formula gives you the numeric values.

In Excel 365 there's the UNIQUE function as well but with older versions you're going to have to enter the unique values manually. On the Insert tab, in the Charts group, click the Pie symbol. The pivot table is by far the easiest way to get all the unique values. The same thing can be done without pivot tables as well but you're going to have to create the two columns yourself. You'll end up with two columns which you can visualize in a chart. Select Pie of Pie chart in the 2D chart section. Select the Pie button, in the charts group. Pivot table puts the text values to the row labels but when you drag the same column to the values field as well the pivot table counts the number of values. Let us say we have the sales of different items of a bakery. That being said you can however create a pivot table from your text column. I don't think you can create a chart using text values alone.

How to create pie chart in excel