---
title: Branching incident diagrams
description: "To make a timeline of events more accurate, you can branch out your incident investigation diagram. Follow these steps:  **Step 1: In the Projects Menu, open your diagram. ** **Step 2: Start by dragging an element into the diagram and hovering…"
url: "https://incident-insight.com/docs/branching-incident-diagrams/"
updated: "2025-07-10"
category: "How-to Guides"
---

# Branching incident diagrams

To make a timeline of events more accurate, you can branch out your incident investigation diagram. Follow these steps: 

**Step 1: In the Projects Menu, open your diagram. **

**Step 2: Start by dragging an element into the diagram and hovering it above or below an existing element. A bold, black indicator should appear when you hover over the element. This shows where the element will branch off if added. A new branch should appear. From here, you can start building out the investigation, adding more elements. **

Note that you can only branch through the following elements: Barrier, Threat, Consequence, and Event.

![](https://incident-insight.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Branching.png)

**From the newly added branch, you can continue the timeline by adding other elements and uncovering the root cause.**![](https://incident-insight.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Branching-2.png)

Incident Investigation Tip: There is no limit to how many branches you can add to an investigation. This feature has been designed to allow you to accurately recreate a timeline of events. Not all incidents are linear, some have multiple factors which need to be accounted for within an in-depth investigation. 

Below is an example of a multi-branch diagram.

![](https://incident-insight.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Branching-3.png)