Ganttdiagramm

Gantt Diagramm, often called a Gantt chart, is a type of bar chart used in project management to illustrate a project schedule. It shows tasks or work packages on the vertical axis and time on the horizontal axis. Each task is represented by a horizontal bar whose position and length encode its start date, duration, and end date. Milestones may be shown as special markers, and dependencies between tasks are commonly indicated with arrows or connecting lines.

The concept was developed by Henry L. Gantt in the 1910s as a simple visual planning tool for production and construction. It gained widespread use in project management across industries and has evolved with software that supports interactive updates and resource assignment.

In use, the diagram helps observers see overlaps, sequences, and deadlines at a glance. It supports planning, coordination, and progress tracking by comparing planned bars with actual progress. Modern variants may include color coding for teams, baselines, and shaded portions to indicate completed work.

Variants and extensions often add features such as resource loading, critical-path highlighting, multiple time scales, or baselines. Digital tools can automatically adjust dates and recalculate dependencies when changes occur, making the Gantt Diagramm a flexible component of many project-management ecosystems.

Strengths include its intuitive visual representation and effectiveness for communicating schedules to stakeholders. Limitations arise with large numbers of tasks, where the chart becomes cluttered, and it does not inherently convey task scope, resource constraints, or alternative scenarios without additional modeling. See also CPM and PERT.