Does Dygraphs work on mobile and all browsers?

Updated

Yes, with one caveat. According to the official Dygraphs documentation, the library "works in all recent browsers," and mobile/tablet devices support pinch-to-zoom. The caveat is Internet Explorer: the site's navigation includes a dedicated "Notes on Internet Explorer" page, which signals that IE needs special handling rather than being treated as a fully supported recent browser. If your audience includes IE users, read that page before committing.

What the official documentation states

The main page makes two compatibility claims:

  • Recent browsers: Dygraphs works in all recent browsers. The library is plain JavaScript, so it runs wherever modern JavaScript runs.
  • Mobile and tablet: Pinch-to-zoom is supported on mobile/tablet devices, on top of the default interactive behaviors.

The default interactions are worth noting because they define the baseline experience on any device:

Interaction How it works
Mouseover Highlights individual values
Click and drag Zooms in
Double-click Zooms back out
Shift-drag Pans
Roller input Change the number and press enter to adjust the averaging period

Pinch-to-zoom is the touch equivalent of the drag-to-zoom gesture, so the core exploration model carries over to phones and tablets.

The Internet Explorer caveat

The presence of a separate "Notes on Internet Explorer" entry in the documentation navigation is the clearest signal in the source material: IE is treated as a distinct case, not as one of the "recent browsers." The page content itself isn't included here, so the specific limitations aren't verifiable from this source. Treat IE support as something to confirm directly on that page rather than assume.

A practical way to verify before you ship

Compatibility claims are only useful once tested against your actual data and options. A reasonable check:

  1. Build a chart with your real dataset and your real option set (for example, customBars: true for high/low bands, or a large rollPeriod).
  2. Load it in each browser version your users actually run, including any IE version still in your support matrix.
  3. On a phone or tablet, test pinch-to-zoom, panning, and the roller input.
  4. Confirm dense data still renders acceptably — the library claims it "plots millions of points without getting bogged down," but that claim is about the library, not about your specific device and dataset combination.

One thing to watch: mirrors and outdated copies

The source page carries an explicit warning: if you are reading it on a mirror rather than the official homepage at https://dygraphs.com/, the information "may be outdated, incomplete and/or locally patched," and links may not work. This matters for compatibility questions specifically, because browser support changes over time. If you installed Dygraphs through a package (the warning mentions the Debian package as one such case), the bundled documentation may not reflect the current release.

For the most current compatibility information, use the official homepage and its Version History page rather than a mirror or a packaged copy.

Bottom line

  • Modern desktop browsers: supported.
  • Mobile and tablet: supported, including pinch-to-zoom.
  • Internet Explorer: consult the dedicated IE notes page; don't assume parity with recent browsers.
  • Before shipping: test your own data, options, and target browser versions, and verify you're reading current documentation rather than a mirror.