I recently found the function subplots, which seems to be a more elegant way of setting up multiple subplots than subplot. However, I don't seem to be able to be able to change the properties of the axes for each subplot.
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import matplotlib as mpl
import numpy as npx = np.linspace(0, 20, 100)
fig, axes = plt.subplots(nrows=2)
for i in range(10):
axes[0].plot(x, i * (x - 10)**2)
plt.ylabel('plot 1')
for i in range(10):
axes[1].plot(x, i * np.cos(x))
plt.ylabel('plot 2')
plt.show()
Only the ylabel for the last plot is shown. The same happens for xlabel, xlim and ylim.
I realise that the point of using subplots is to create common layouts of subplots, but if sharex and sharey are set to false, then shouldn't I be able to change some parameters?
One solution would be to use the subplot function instead, but do I need to do this?
Yes you probably want to use the individual subplot instances.
As you've found, plt.ylabel sets the ylabel of the last active plot. To change the parameters of an individual Axes, i.e. subplot, you can use any one of the available methods. To change the ylabel, you can use axes[0].set_ylabel('plot 1').
pyplot, or plt as you've defined it, is a helper module for quickly accessing Axes and Figure methods without needing to store these objects in variables. As the documentation states:
[Pyplot p]rovides a MATLAB-like plotting framework.
You can still use this interface, but you will need to adjust which Axes is the currently active Axes. To do this, pyplot has an axes(h) method, where h is an instance of an Axes. So in you're example, you would call plt.axes(axes[0]) to set the first subplot active, then plt.axes(axes[1]) to set the other.
Related
i use jupyterlab together with matplotlib widgets. I have ipywidgets installed.
My goal is to choose which y-axis data is displayed in the bottom of the figure.
When i use the interactive tool to see the coordinates i get only the data of the right y-axis displayed. Both would be really nice^^ My minimal code example:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
%matplotlib widgets
x=np.linspace(0,100)
y=x**2
y2=x**3
fig,ax=plt.subplots()
ax2=ax.twinx()
ax.plot(x,y)
ax2.plot(x,y2)
plt.show()
With this example you might ask why not to plot them to the same y-axis but thats why it is a minimal example. I would like to plot data of different units.
To choose which y-axis is used, you can set the zorder property of the axes containing this y-axis to a higher value than that of the other axes (0 is the default):
ax.zorder = 1
However, that will cause this Axes to obscure the other Axes. To counteract this, use
ax.set_facecolor((0, 0, 0, 0))
to make the background color of this Axes transparent.
Alternatively, use the grab_mouse function of the figure canvas:
fig.canvas.grab_mouse(ax)
See here for the (minimal) documentation for grab_mouse.
The reason this works is this:
The coordinate line shown below the figure is obtained by an event callback which ultimately calls matplotlib.Axes.format_coord() on the axes instance returned by the inaxes property of the matplotlib events that are being generated by your mouse movement. This Axes is the one returned by FigureCanvasBase.inaxes() which uses the Axes zorder, and in case of ties, chooses the last Axes created.
However, you can tell the figure canvas that one Axes should receive all mouse events, in which case this Axes is also set as the inaxes property of generated events (see the code).
I have not found a clean way to make the display show data from both Axes. The only solution I have found would be to monkey-patch NavigationToolbar2._mouse_event_to_message (also here) to do what you want.
I have a number of subplots in a figure fig1, created via
ax = fig1.add_subplot(221)
I then plot stuff in each of the subplots via
im=ax.plot(x,y)
and add some axis labels via
ax.set_xlabel('xlabel')
I would then like to clear a specific subplot completely, as described in When to use cla(), clf() or close() for clearing a plot in matplotlib?. However the problem is that ax.cla()and ax.clear() seem to only clear the data from the plot, without removing the axes, axis tick labels etc. On the other hand plt.clf() clears the entire figure. Is there something in between? A clf-like command that clears everything in a subplot, including axis labels? Or have I simply used the commands in a wrong way?
ax.clear() clears the axes. That is, it removes all settings and data from the axes such that you are left with an axes, just as it had been just created.
ax.axis("off") turns the axes off, such that all axes spines and ticklabels are hidden.
ax.set_visible(False) turns the complete axes invisible, including the data that is in it.
ax.remove() removes the axes from the figure.
Complete example:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
fig,axes = plt.subplots(2,3)
for ax in axes.flat:
ax.plot([2,3,1])
axes[0,1].clear()
axes[1,0].axis("off")
axes[1,1].set_visible(False)
axes[0,2].remove()
plt.show()
I can't figure out how to rotate the text on the X Axis. Its a time stamp, so as the number of samples increase, they get closer and closer until they overlap. I'd like to rotate the text 90 degrees so as the samples get closer together, they aren't overlapping.
Below is what I have, it works fine with the exception that I can't figure out how to rotate the X axis text.
import sys
import matplotlib
matplotlib.use('Agg')
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import datetime
font = {'family' : 'normal',
'weight' : 'bold',
'size' : 8}
matplotlib.rc('font', **font)
values = open('stats.csv', 'r').readlines()
time = [datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp(float(i.split(',')[0].strip())) for i in values[1:]]
delay = [float(i.split(',')[1].strip()) for i in values[1:]]
plt.plot(time, delay)
plt.grid(b='on')
plt.savefig('test.png')
This works for me:
plt.xticks(rotation=90)
Many "correct" answers here but I'll add one more since I think some details are left out of several. The OP asked for 90 degree rotation but I'll change to 45 degrees because when you use an angle that isn't zero or 90, you should change the horizontal alignment as well; otherwise your labels will be off-center and a bit misleading (and I'm guessing many people who come here want to rotate axes to something other than 90).
Easiest / Least Code
Option 1
plt.xticks(rotation=45, ha='right')
As mentioned previously, that may not be desirable if you'd rather take the Object Oriented approach.
Option 2
Another fast way (it's intended for date objects but seems to work on any label; doubt this is recommended though):
fig.autofmt_xdate(rotation=45)
fig you would usually get from:
fig = plt.gcf()
fig = plt.figure()
fig, ax = plt.subplots()
fig = ax.figure
Object-Oriented / Dealing directly with ax
Option 3a
If you have the list of labels:
labels = ['One', 'Two', 'Three']
ax.set_xticks([1, 2, 3])
ax.set_xticklabels(labels, rotation=45, ha='right')
In later versions of Matplotlib (3.5+), you can just use set_xticks alone:
ax.set_xticks([1, 2, 3], labels, rotation=45, ha='right')
Option 3b
If you want to get the list of labels from the current plot:
# Unfortunately you need to draw your figure first to assign the labels,
# otherwise get_xticklabels() will return empty strings.
plt.draw()
ax.set_xticks(ax.get_xticks())
ax.set_xticklabels(ax.get_xticklabels(), rotation=45, ha='right')
As above, in later versions of Matplotlib (3.5+), you can just use set_xticks alone:
ax.set_xticks(ax.get_xticks(), ax.get_xticklabels(), rotation=45, ha='right')
Option 4
Similar to above, but loop through manually instead.
for label in ax.get_xticklabels():
label.set_rotation(45)
label.set_ha('right')
Option 5
We still use pyplot (as plt) here but it's object-oriented because we're changing the property of a specific ax object.
plt.setp(ax.get_xticklabels(), rotation=45, ha='right')
Option 6
This option is simple, but AFAIK you can't set label horizontal align this way so another option might be better if your angle is not 90.
ax.tick_params(axis='x', labelrotation=45)
Edit:
There's discussion of this exact "bug" but a fix hasn't been released (as of 3.4.0):
https://github.com/matplotlib/matplotlib/issues/13774
Easy way
As described here, there is an existing method in the matplotlib.pyplot figure class that automatically rotates dates appropriately for you figure.
You can call it after you plot your data (i.e.ax.plot(dates,ydata) :
fig.autofmt_xdate()
If you need to format the labels further, checkout the above link.
Non-datetime objects
As per languitar's comment, the method I suggested for non-datetime xticks would not update correctly when zooming, etc. If it's not a datetime object used as your x-axis data, you should follow Tommy's answer:
for tick in ax.get_xticklabels():
tick.set_rotation(45)
Try pyplot.setp. I think you could do something like this:
x = range(len(time))
plt.xticks(x, time)
locs, labels = plt.xticks()
plt.setp(labels, rotation=90)
plt.plot(x, delay)
Appart from
plt.xticks(rotation=90)
this is also possible:
plt.xticks(rotation='vertical')
I came up with a similar example. Again, the rotation keyword is.. well, it's key.
from pylab import *
fig = figure()
ax = fig.add_subplot(111)
ax.bar( [0,1,2], [1,3,5] )
ax.set_xticks( [ 0.5, 1.5, 2.5 ] )
ax.set_xticklabels( ['tom','dick','harry'], rotation=45 ) ;
If you want to apply rotation on the axes object, the easiest way is using tick_params. For example.
ax.tick_params(axis='x', labelrotation=90)
Matplotlib documentation reference here.
This is useful when you have an array of axes as returned by plt.subplots, and it is more convenient than using set_xticks because in that case you need to also set the tick labels, and also more convenient that those that iterate over the ticks (for obvious reasons)
If using plt:
plt.xticks(rotation=90)
In case of using pandas or seaborn to plot, assuming ax as axes for the plot:
ax.set_xticklabels(ax.get_xticklabels(), rotation=90)
Another way of doing the above:
for tick in ax.get_xticklabels():
tick.set_rotation(45)
My answer is inspired by cjohnson318's answer, but I didn't want to supply a hardcoded list of labels; I wanted to rotate the existing labels:
for tick in ax.get_xticklabels():
tick.set_rotation(45)
The simplest solution is to use:
plt.xticks(rotation=XX)
but also
# Tweak spacing to prevent clipping of tick-labels
plt.subplots_adjust(bottom=X.XX)
e.g for dates I used rotation=45 and bottom=0.20 but you can do some test for your data
import pylab as pl
pl.xticks(rotation = 90)
To rotate the x-axis label to 90 degrees
for tick in ax.get_xticklabels():
tick.set_rotation(45)
It will depend on what are you plotting.
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
x=['long_text_for_a_label_a',
'long_text_for_a_label_b',
'long_text_for_a_label_c']
y=[1,2,3]
myplot = plt.plot(x,y)
for item in myplot.axes.get_xticklabels():
item.set_rotation(90)
For pandas and seaborn that give you an Axes object:
df = pd.DataFrame(x,y)
#pandas
myplot = df.plot.bar()
#seaborn
myplotsns =sns.barplot(y='0', x=df.index, data=df)
# you can get xticklabels without .axes cause the object are already a
# isntance of it
for item in myplot.get_xticklabels():
item.set_rotation(90)
If you need to rotate labels you may need change the font size too, you can use font_scale=1.0 to do that.
I've drawn a plot that looks something like the following:
It was created using the following code:
import numpy as np
import pandas as pd
import matplotlib as mpl
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
# 1. Plot a figure consisting of 3 separate axes
# ==============================================
plotNames = ['Plot1','Plot2','Plot3']
figure, axisList = plt.subplots(len(plotNames), sharex=True, sharey=True)
tempDF = pd.DataFrame()
tempDF['date'] = pd.date_range('2015-01-01','2015-12-31',freq='D')
tempDF['value'] = np.random.randn(tempDF['date'].size)
tempDF['value2'] = np.random.randn(tempDF['date'].size)
for i in range(len(plotNames)):
axisList[i].plot_date(tempDF['date'],tempDF['value'],'b-',xdate=True)
# 2. Create a new single axis in the figure. This new axis sits over
# the top of the axes drawn previously. Make all the components of
# the new single axis invisibe except for the x and y labels.
big_ax = figure.add_subplot(111)
big_ax.set_axis_bgcolor('none')
big_ax.set_xlabel('Date',fontweight='bold')
big_ax.set_ylabel('Random normal',fontweight='bold')
big_ax.tick_params(labelcolor='none', top='off', bottom='off', left='off', right='off')
big_ax.spines['right'].set_visible(False)
big_ax.spines['top'].set_visible(False)
big_ax.spines['left'].set_visible(False)
big_ax.spines['bottom'].set_visible(False)
# 3. Plot a separate figure
# =========================
figure2,ax2 = plt.subplots()
ax2.plot_date(tempDF['date'],tempDF['value2'],'-',xdate=True,color='green')
ax2.set_xlabel('Date',fontweight='bold')
ax2.set_ylabel('Random normal',fontweight='bold')
# Save plot
# =========
plt.savefig('tempPlot.png',dpi=300)
Basically, the rationale for plotting the whole picture is as follows:
Create the first figure and plot 3 separate axes using a loop
Plot a single axis in the same figure to sit on top of the graphs
drawn previously. Label the x and y axes. Make all other aspects of
this axis invisible.
Create a second figure and plot data on a single axis.
The plot displays just as I want when using jupyter-notebook but when the plot is saved, the file contains only the second figure.
I was under the impression that plots could have multiple figures and that figures could have multiple axes. However, I suspect I have a fundamental misunderstanding of the differences between plots, subplots, figures and axes. Can someone please explain what I'm doing wrong and explain how to get the whole image to save to a single file.
Matplotlib does not have "plots". In that sense,
plots are figures
subplots are axes
During runtime of a script you can have as many figures as you wish. Calling plt.save() will save the currently active figure, i.e. the figure you would get by calling plt.gcf().
You can save any other figure either by providing a figure number num:
plt.figure(num)
plt.savefig("output.png")
or by having a refence to the figure object fig1
fig1.savefig("output.png")
In order to save several figures into one file, one could go the way detailed here: Python saving multiple figures into one PDF file.
Another option would be not to create several figures, but a single one, using subplots,
fig = plt.figure()
ax = plt.add_subplot(611)
ax2 = plt.add_subplot(612)
ax3 = plt.add_subplot(613)
ax4 = plt.add_subplot(212)
and then plot the respective graphs to those axes using
ax.plot(x,y)
or in the case of a pandas dataframe df
df.plot(x="column1", y="column2", ax=ax)
This second option can of course be generalized to arbitrary axes positions using subplots on grids. This is detailed in the matplotlib user's guide Customizing Location of Subplot Using GridSpec
Furthermore, it is possible to position an axes (a subplot so to speak) at any position in the figure using fig.add_axes([left, bottom, width, height]) (where left, bottom, width, height are in figure coordinates, ranging from 0 to 1).
In a figure with 2x2 subplots, I need both the subplots on the right to share the x-axis, but the ones on the left not to share their axis. In addition, I need the subplot that is determining the x-axis limits to have 'equal' aspect ratio. I tried this:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
fig, ax = plt.subplots(2, 2, figsize=(12, 9))
# Subplot [0,1]
ax[0,1].axis('equal')
ax[0,1].plot(...)
[xmin01, xmax01, ymin01, ymax01] = self.ax[0,1].axis()
# Subplot [1,1]
ax[1,1].plot(...)
ax[1,1].set_xlim(left=xmin01, right=xmax01)
This is not working: the limits of the x-axis returned by axis() are near the data limits and are not the real limits shown in the graphed subplot. Changing the position of ax[0,1].axis('equal') after the plot command has no effect. Any idea?
Looking into the pyplot source code I discovered that axis('equal') is calling the method set_aspect(). This latter method is modifying the variable self._aspect but it is not further updating anything related! Then, I looked for and found the method that is really updating the aspect ratio: it is named apply_aspect(). So, it doesn't seem very elegant, but at least my problem is solved as shown:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
fig, ax = plt.subplots(2, 2, figsize=(12, 9))
# Subplot [0,1]
ax[0,1].axis('equal')
ax[0,1].plot(...)
ax[0,1].apply_aspect()
[xmin01, xmax01, ymin01, ymax01] = self.ax[0,1].axis()
# Subplot [1,1]
ax[1,1].plot(...)
ax[1,1].set_xlim(left=xmin01, right=xmax01)