I'm trying to render data from an AJAX response as a bar chart with jqplot. To render this bar chart I use two variables: s1 which contains the numbers ex: s1 = [22,67,32,89] ticks which contains the name corresponding to a number inside s1 ex: ticks = ["Jack", "Mary", "Paul", "John"] So my AJAX returns two variables, data1 and data2. When I console.log(data1) I get 22,67,32,89 When I console.log(data2) I get "Jack", "Mary", "Paul", "John" I then add the square brackets and change variable: s1 = [data1] ticks = [data2] When I console.log(s1) I get ["22,67,32,89"] When I console.log(ticks) I get "Jack", "Mary", "Paul", "John" And the graph does not render, this is my code: s1 = [data]; ticks = [data]; plot4 = $.jqplot('chartdiv4', [s1], { animate: !$.jqplot.use_excanvas, series:[{color:'#5FAB78'}], seriesDefaults:{ renderer:$.jqplot.BarRenderer, pointLabels: { show: true } }, axes: { xaxis: { renderer: $.jqplot.CategoryAxisRenderer, ticks: ticks }, yaxis:{min:0, max:100, label:'%',labelRenderer: $.jqplot.CanvasAxisLabelRenderer} }, highlighter: { show: false } }); });