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Aggregate features

Spatial aggregation summarizes features such as points, lines, and polygons within designated areas. It involves calculating the total number of features within each bounding area, as well as any specified statistics for the points, lines, or polygons. With lines and polygons, you can also calculate the summarized geography (length of lines and area) within the bounding areas. In ArcGIS for SharePoint, you can perform spatial aggregation using the Spatial aggregation tab in the Analysis pane.

The resulting layer displays any of the following:

  • When aggregating within polygons, styling is by the Size symbol type.
  • When aggregating within bins, styling is by the Color symbol type.
  • When points are being aggregated, styling is by the count of points.
  • Summarized geometry is styled by the feature's geometry.
    • Summarized lines are styled by summarized length.
    • Summarized polygons are styled by summarized area.
    • If no summarized geometry exists, styling is by the count of features.

Your organization administrator must grant you the appropriate user type, role, and privileges to perform spatial analysis. In addition, certain capabilities require additional privileges, such as the ArcGIS Network Analyst extension and ArcGIS GeoEnrichment Service. Running these processes may consume credits. For more information about how ArcGIS uses credits, see Understand credits in the ArcGIS Online help.

Note:

Spatial aggregation is one method for visualizing high-density data. For more information, as well as an overview of other methods, see Best practices for visualizing high-density data.

To use Spatial aggregation, complete the following steps:

  1. From the map tools, click AnalysisAnalysis.

    The analysis tools appear. The Measure tab is active by default.

  2. Click the Spatial aggregation tab Spatial aggregation.
  3. Populate the following parameters:

    • Layer to summarize—The layer that will be summarized.
    • Summary area type—Specifies the type of boundaries in which the features will be summarized. Options are Polygon layer, Square bins, and Hexagon bins.
    • Bin size—The size of the generated bins. For square bins, the value is equal to the height and width of the bins. For hexagon bins, the value determines the distance between parallel sides. This parameter is available when Square bins or Hexagon bins is specified for Summary area type.
      Note:

      When Polygon layer is specified for Summary area type, the Summary polygon layer drop-down menu appears. You can select the Boundary layer from this drop-down menu.

    • Calculate statistics—Use to help you determine which number or date fields from the input layer to summarize. Supported summary statistics include sum, minimum, maximum, mean, and standard deviation. The statistics are calculated for each boundary separately.
      Note:

      Date fields support maximum and minimum. Number fields support sum, minimum, maximum, mean, and standard deviation. String fields are not supported.

    • Keep areas with no points—Specifies the areas that are included in the result layer. If checked (default), all generated bins or input polygons are returned, including those that do not overlap input points. If unchecked, bins or polygons with no summarized points are removed from the output.
      Note:

      Currently, this parameter is only available when the Layer to summarize value is a point layer. Summarizing lines or polygons is not supported with this parameter.

    • Result layer name—The name of the layer that is created and displayed. The name must be unique. If a layer with the same name already exists in your organization, the tool fails and you are prompted to use a different name. This is a required parameter.

  4. Click Run.

    The result dataset is saved as a layer to the map and to the Layers list and as a hosted feature service to your organizational account.

    The Save result layer to ArcGIS toggle button is on by default, which saves the layer to your ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise content. Optionally, if the toggle button is turned off, the layer is only added to the Layers list as a temporary feature layer Feature layer not saved to ArcGIS.

  5. Provide a name in Save in folder to save the result in a folder of the same name in My content.