# The state of AI-assisted data visualization > Research, practitioner evidence, capability scorecards, and focused deep dives on AI-assisted data visualization as of August 2026. Evidence is current through August 14, 2026; recheck after November 14, 2026 or a material capability or benchmark release. This is a research and evidence package, not a product leaderboard. It covers visualization generation, chart understanding, critique, practitioner work, reader outcomes, human learning, agent skills, specialized vision, benchmarks, and forecasts. ## How to use this package - Treat the package as a dated state-of-the-field synthesis, not settled law. - Keep observed findings, author or product testimony, synthesis, and forecasts distinct. - Do not turn a component benchmark into a field-wide capability, production-readiness, or reader-outcome claim. - Evaluate visualization quality in its declared use context, including audience, data semantics, delivery surface, stakes, and maintenance. - Follow report links to primary sources before repeating quantitative or time-sensitive claims. ## Start here - [Executive summary](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/executive-summary/source.md): The shortest complete orientation. - [Research synthesis](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/research-review/source.md): Capabilities, techniques, convergence, divergence, negative findings, and evidence gaps. - [Practitioner and reader experience](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/practitioner-and-reader-experience/source.md): Jobs, tools, creator experience, maintenance, and reader outcomes. - [Capability scorecard](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/capability-scorecard/): Current, historical, and forecast judgments against a fixed contextual rubric. - [Content map](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/content-map/): Relationships and reading paths across the package. - [Update log](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/updates/): Dated changes for every report and visual experience. ## Visual experiences - [The state of AI-assisted data visualization research](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/research/): An explanatory field guide to goals, use contexts, techniques, convergence, disagreement, failure evidence, benchmarks, and the 36-month capability timeline. - [The practitioner and reader experience](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/practitioner-experience/): What people are trying to accomplish, which tools they reach for, what feels newly possible, and where correction, trust, maintenance, and reader experience still break down. - [How close are we to the ideal?](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/capability-scorecard/): Context-specific scorecards for generation and understanding, reconstructed backward through time and connected to explicit forecasts. - [Map of the research corpus](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/content-map/): A non-linear view of the questions, reports, evidence layers, gaps, and relationships across the complete working corpus. - [Who needs this research?](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/audience-and-rollout/): A reader-first map of audiences, decisions, useful formats, discovery routes, and evidence needed to distinguish possible output from accomplished work and actual use. ## Core synthesis - [Executive summary](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/executive-summary/source.md): The central findings, limits, and practical implications in one short reading path. - [Research review](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/research-review/source.md): The full literature synthesis and technique history behind the visual field guide. - [Practitioner and reader experience](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/practitioner-and-reader-experience/source.md): Tool landscape, jobs, creator accounts, reader reactions, and the gap between possibility, accomplishment, and experience. - [Ideal state and capability scorecards](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/ideal-state-and-scorecards/source.md): Definitions of excellent generation and understanding, current scores by context, historical reconstructions, and forecast states. ## Capability and evidence deep dives - [What the benchmarks actually measure](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/benchmark-crosswalk/source.md): A crosswalk from benchmark scores to the capability demonstrated—and the claims each benchmark cannot support. - [Data-visualization skills for coding agents](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/agent-skills/source.md): A comparative reading of skill packages, their techniques, adoption signals, testing evidence, and likely durability as base models improve. - [Specialized vision models](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/specialized-vision-models/source.md): Where chart-specific perception, OCR, structured reconstruction, and visual critics outperform general models—and where they do not. - [Human skills and banked gains](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/human-skills-and-gains/source.md): What novices, intermediate practitioners, and experts gain today, what remains unproven, and which human capabilities become more important. - [Learning when AI can make the chart](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/learning-with-ai/source.md): What becomes easier to learn, what can be lost when learners skip construction, and how curricula should rebalance. - [What would unlock the next capabilities?](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/capability-forecast/source.md): Measurable gates, evidence-based timeframes, and the distinction between gains from stronger models and gains from better technique. ## Publishing and use - [Audience, decisions, and rollout](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/audience-decisions-and-rollout/source.md): Who may use the work, what decisions it should help, and how to gather evidence of actual use without confusing attention with impact. - [Editorial architecture](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/reports/editorial-architecture/source.md): How the comprehensive report and a non-linear series can coexist as two views of one maintained research corpus. ## Machine-readable indexes - [Structured corpus index](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/corpus.json): Typed inventory, canonical URLs, dates, purpose, and interpretation rules. - [Release manifest](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/release-manifest.json): SHA-256 file inventory for the deployed release. - [Sitemap](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/sitemap.xml): Canonical human-readable routes. - [Update log](https://viz.lyra-forge.com/updates/): Human-readable history compiled from the per-piece records.