5 Gantt Chart Tips for Smarter Project Scheduling
These Gantt chart tips are for the moment one deadline moves and the rest of the plan has to move with it. The Gantt chart in Planfix puts the real duration of every task on a timeline, and five settings make it keep the schedule up to date instead of you doing it by hand. This short video goes through all five.
What You’ll Learn: Five Gantt Chart Tips in Planfix
- How the chart shows a project’s timeline and the duration of each task (0:15).
- How to move a deadline by dragging a task, or type exact dates instead.
- How to link tasks with arrows and edit a dependency (0:30).
- How to track workload and adjust deadlines flexibly (0:45).
- How to compare the current schedule with the baseline plan (1:00).
How to Set Up the Gantt Chart in Planfix, Step by Step
Step 1. Switch the Project to the Gantt View
Open the Tasks section and enable the Gantt view above the task list, at the top right. The chart draws the actual duration of every task on a timeline, so one look tells you which stage the project has reached. It also respects the working time set in the assignee’s employee card, which keeps the dates honest.
Step 2. Move Deadlines on the Chart
Deadlines can be changed right on the chart: drag a task to a new place, or stretch it to change its duration. When you need exact values rather than an estimate, click the task to open its settings window and enter the dates or the duration manually. Both ways update the task itself, not a separate plan that then has to be synchronized.
Step 3. Link Tasks and Manage Dependencies
Connect tasks with arrows directly on the chart to say which one has to finish before the next can start. Clicking an arrow opens the existing dependency for editing, so a sequence can be corrected as the project changes. This is the part that turns a list of dates into a schedule, because it records the order the work actually has.
Step 4. Turn On Automatic Date Shifting
For more control, open the system settings and enable automatic date shifting for linked tasks. After that, moving one task moves everything that depends on it, and a delay at the start of the chain no longer has to be carried through the plan by hand. It is the single setting that saves the most time on a long project.
Step 5. Compare the Plan with the Baseline
To see where the schedule has drifted, turn on the baseline plan option in the settings and select a snapshot date. Planfix lays the original deadlines over the current chart and highlights the misalignments, so you can tell at a glance which task slipped, which one finished early, and what that did to the project end date.
Tune the View to the Way You Work
A chart you cannot read is a chart nobody updates. Change the time scale to zoom from days to months, display assignees next to the tasks to see who carries the load, and apply filters to leave only the items that matter for this conversation. On a project with hundreds of tasks, those three settings are the difference between a planning tool and a wall of bars.
Who It’s For
- Project managers: dependencies and automatic date shifts instead of rebuilding the plan after every delay.
- Team leads: assignees shown on the chart, so overload is visible before the deadline is.
- Executives: the baseline plan next to the current one, which answers how far the project has drifted.
- Client-facing teams: a filtered chart that shows a customer only their part of the timeline.
FAQ
How do you open the Gantt chart in Planfix?
Open the Tasks section and enable the Gantt view above the task list at the top right. The chart then shows the planned dates and the dependencies of the tasks in that list.
Do linked tasks move automatically when a deadline changes?
They do once you enable automatic date shifting for linked tasks in the system settings. Until then, a dependency only records the order of the work; the dates stay where you put them.
What does the baseline plan show on a Gantt chart?
It overlays the deadlines as they stood on a chosen snapshot date on top of the current chart, highlighting where tasks finished late or early and how that moved the end of the project.
Final Thoughts
Take one live project, switch it to the Gantt view and spend ten minutes on links and automatic date shifting; the next delay will cost you one drag instead of an evening. To go deeper into the order of work, see how to set up sequential tasks with step-by-step handoffs. New to Planfix? Sign up and build your first chart.
This video was featured in What’s New in Planfix: October 2026.
