Swimlane diagram
A swimlane diagram is a flowchart that organizes activities into horizontal or vertical lanes, with each lane representing a different actor, role, or department responsible for those activities.
In depth
Swimlane diagrams (also called cross-functional flowcharts) extend the basic flowchart by adding lanes that make ownership explicit. Every activity sits inside exactly one lane, and arrows that cross lanes are handoffs — usually the most important parts of the process to investigate.
Common use cases include customer onboarding (Sales → Onboarding → Success), incident response (Detection → Triage → Resolution → Comms), and approval workflows (Requester → Reviewer → Approver → Finance).
OpenCharts supports both horizontal and vertical swimlanes. AI generation places activities in the right lane automatically based on the actor described in your prompt.
Examples
- Cross-functional customer onboarding
- IT change management
- Procurement and approval workflow
Also known as
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Build a swimlane diagramRelated terms
Process map
A process map is a visual representation of a workflow that documents the sequence of steps, decision points, and handoffs needed to complete a business outcome.
BPMN
BPMN (Business Process Model and Notation) is a standardized graphical language for modeling business processes using pools, lanes, gateways, activities, and events.
Flowchart
A flowchart is a diagram that represents a process, workflow, or algorithm using shapes (nodes) connected by arrows (edges) to show the order of steps.