matplotlib.figure

matplotlib.figure implements the following classes:

Figure
Top level Artist, which holds all plot elements. Many methods are implemented in FigureBase.
SubFigure
A logical figure inside a figure, usually added to a figure (or parent SubFigure) with Figure.add_subfigure or Figure.subfigures methods (provisional API v3.4).
SubplotParams
Control the default spacing between subplots.
class matplotlib.figure.Figure(figsize=None, dpi=None, facecolor=None, edgecolor=None, linewidth=0.0, frameon=None, subplotpars=None, tight_layout=None, constrained_layout=None)[source]

The top level container for all the plot elements.

The Figure instance supports callbacks through a callbacks attribute which is a CallbackRegistry instance. The events you can connect to are 'dpi_changed', and the callback will be called with func(fig) where fig is the Figure instance.

Attributes:
patch

The Rectangle instance representing the figure background patch.

suppressComposite

For multiple figure images, the figure will make composite images depending on the renderer option_image_nocomposite function. If suppressComposite is a boolean, this will override the renderer.

Parameters:
figsize2-tuple of floats, default: rcParams["figure.figsize"] (default: [6.4, 4.8])

Figure dimension (width, height) in inches.

dpifloat, default: rcParams["figure.dpi"] (default: 100.0)

Dots per inch.

facecolordefault: rcParams["figure.facecolor"] (default: 'white')

The figure patch facecolor.

edgecolordefault: rcParams["figure.edgecolor"] (default: 'white')

The figure patch edge color.

linewidthfloat

The linewidth of the frame (i.e. the edge linewidth of the figure patch).

frameonbool, default: rcParams["figure.frameon"] (default: True)

If False, suppress drawing the figure background patch.

subplotparsSubplotParams

Subplot parameters. If not given, the default subplot parameters rcParams["figure.subplot.*"] are used.

tight_layoutbool or dict, default: rcParams["figure.autolayout"] (default: False)

If False use subplotpars. If True adjust subplot parameters using tight_layout with default padding. When providing a dict containing the keys pad, w_pad, h_pad, and rect, the default tight_layout paddings will be overridden.

constrained_layoutbool, default: rcParams["figure.constrained_layout.use"] (default: False)

If True use constrained layout to adjust positioning of plot elements. Like tight_layout, but designed to be more flexible. See Constrained Layout Guide for examples. (Note: does not work with add_subplot or subplot2grid.)

add_artist(artist, clip=False)

Add an Artist to the figure.

Usually artists are added to Axes objects using Axes.add_artist; this method can be used in the rare cases where one needs to add artists directly to the figure instead.

Parameters:
artistArtist

The artist to add to the figure. If the added artist has no transform previously set, its transform will be set to figure.transSubfigure.

clipbool, default: False

Whether the added artist should be clipped by the figure patch.

Returns:
Artist

The added artist.

add_axes(*args, **kwargs)

Add an Axes to the figure.

Call signatures:

add_axes(rect, projection=None, polar=False, **kwargs)
add_axes(ax)
Parameters:
rectsequence of float

The dimensions [left, bottom, width, height] of the new Axes. All quantities are in fractions of figure width and height.

projection{None, 'aitoff', 'hammer', 'lambert', 'mollweide', 'polar', 'rectilinear', str}, optional

The projection type of the Axes. str is the name of a custom projection, see projections. The default None results in a 'rectilinear' projection.

polarbool, default: False

If True, equivalent to projection='polar'.

axes_classsubclass type of Axes, optional

The axes.Axes subclass that is instantiated. This parameter is incompatible with projection and polar. See axisartist for examples.

sharex, shareyAxes, optional

Share the x or y axis with sharex and/or sharey. The axis will have the same limits, ticks, and scale as the axis of the shared axes.

labelstr

A label for the returned Axes.

Returns:
Axes, or a subclass of Axes

The returned axes class depends on the projection used. It is Axes if rectilinear projection is used and projections.polar.PolarAxes if polar projection is used.

Other Parameters:
**kwargs

This method also takes the keyword arguments for the returned Axes class. The keyword arguments for the rectilinear Axes class Axes can be found in the following table but there might also be other keyword arguments if another projection is used, see the actual Axes class.

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float

Notes

In rare circumstances, add_axes may be called with a single argument, an Axes instance already created in the present figure but not in the figure's list of Axes.

Examples

Some simple examples:

rect = l, b, w, h
fig = plt.figure()
fig.add_axes(rect)
fig.add_axes(rect, frameon=False, facecolor='g')
fig.add_axes(rect, polar=True)
ax = fig.add_axes(rect, projection='polar')
fig.delaxes(ax)
fig.add_axes(ax)
add_axobserver(func)[source]

Whenever the Axes state change, func(self) will be called.

add_callback(func)

Add a callback function that will be called whenever one of the Artist's properties changes.

Parameters:
funccallable

The callback function. It must have the signature:

def func(artist: Artist) -> Any

where artist is the calling Artist. Return values may exist but are ignored.

Returns:
int

The observer id associated with the callback. This id can be used for removing the callback with remove_callback later.

See also

remove_callback
add_gridspec(nrows=1, ncols=1, **kwargs)

Return a GridSpec that has this figure as a parent. This allows complex layout of Axes in the figure.

Parameters:
nrowsint, default: 1

Number of rows in grid.

ncolsint, default: 1

Number or columns in grid.

Returns:
GridSpec
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Keyword arguments are passed to GridSpec.

Examples

Adding a subplot that spans two rows:

fig = plt.figure()
gs = fig.add_gridspec(2, 2)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(gs[0, 0])
ax2 = fig.add_subplot(gs[1, 0])
# spans two rows:
ax3 = fig.add_subplot(gs[:, 1])
add_subfigure(subplotspec, **kwargs)

Add a SubFigure to the figure as part of a subplot arrangement.

Parameters:
subplotspecgridspec.SubplotSpec

Defines the region in a parent gridspec where the subfigure will be placed.

Returns:
figure.SubFigure
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Are passed to the SubFigure object.

add_subplot(*args, **kwargs)

Add an Axes to the figure as part of a subplot arrangement.

Call signatures:

add_subplot(nrows, ncols, index, **kwargs)
add_subplot(pos, **kwargs)
add_subplot(ax)
add_subplot()
Parameters:
*argsint, (int, int, index), or SubplotSpec, default: (1, 1, 1)

The position of the subplot described by one of

  • Three integers (nrows, ncols, index). The subplot will take the index position on a grid with nrows rows and ncols columns. index starts at 1 in the upper left corner and increases to the right. index can also be a two-tuple specifying the (first, last) indices (1-based, and including last) of the subplot, e.g., fig.add_subplot(3, 1, (1, 2)) makes a subplot that spans the upper 2/3 of the figure.
  • A 3-digit integer. The digits are interpreted as if given separately as three single-digit integers, i.e. fig.add_subplot(235) is the same as fig.add_subplot(2, 3, 5). Note that this can only be used if there are no more than 9 subplots.
  • A SubplotSpec.

In rare circumstances, add_subplot may be called with a single argument, a subplot Axes instance already created in the present figure but not in the figure's list of Axes.

projection{None, 'aitoff', 'hammer', 'lambert', 'mollweide', 'polar', 'rectilinear', str}, optional

The projection type of the subplot (Axes). str is the name of a custom projection, see projections. The default None results in a 'rectilinear' projection.

polarbool, default: False

If True, equivalent to projection='polar'.

axes_classsubclass type of Axes, optional

The axes.Axes subclass that is instantiated. This parameter is incompatible with projection and polar. See axisartist for examples.

sharex, shareyAxes, optional

Share the x or y axis with sharex and/or sharey. The axis will have the same limits, ticks, and scale as the axis of the shared axes.

labelstr

A label for the returned Axes.

Returns:
axes.SubplotBase, or another subclass of Axes

The Axes of the subplot. The returned Axes base class depends on the projection used. It is Axes if rectilinear projection is used and projections.polar.PolarAxes if polar projection is used. The returned Axes is then a subplot subclass of the base class.

Other Parameters:
**kwargs

This method also takes the keyword arguments for the returned Axes base class; except for the figure argument. The keyword arguments for the rectilinear base class Axes can be found in the following table but there might also be other keyword arguments if another projection is used.

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float

Examples

fig = plt.figure()

fig.add_subplot(231)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(2, 3, 1)  # equivalent but more general

fig.add_subplot(232, frameon=False)  # subplot with no frame
fig.add_subplot(233, projection='polar')  # polar subplot
fig.add_subplot(234, sharex=ax1)  # subplot sharing x-axis with ax1
fig.add_subplot(235, facecolor="red")  # red subplot

ax1.remove()  # delete ax1 from the figure
fig.add_subplot(ax1)  # add ax1 back to the figure
align_labels(axs=None)

Align the xlabels and ylabels of subplots with the same subplots row or column (respectively) if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list (or ndarray) of Axes to align the labels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

align_xlabels(axs=None)

Align the xlabels of subplots in the same subplot column if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

If a label is on the bottom, it is aligned with labels on Axes that also have their label on the bottom and that have the same bottom-most subplot row. If the label is on the top, it is aligned with labels on Axes with the same top-most row.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list of (or ndarray) Axes to align the xlabels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

Notes

This assumes that axs are from the same GridSpec, so that their SubplotSpec positions correspond to figure positions.

Examples

Example with rotated xtick labels:

fig, axs = plt.subplots(1, 2)
for tick in axs[0].get_xticklabels():
    tick.set_rotation(55)
axs[0].set_xlabel('XLabel 0')
axs[1].set_xlabel('XLabel 1')
fig.align_xlabels()
align_ylabels(axs=None)

Align the ylabels of subplots in the same subplot column if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

If a label is on the left, it is aligned with labels on Axes that also have their label on the left and that have the same left-most subplot column. If the label is on the right, it is aligned with labels on Axes with the same right-most column.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list (or ndarray) of Axes to align the ylabels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

Notes

This assumes that axs are from the same GridSpec, so that their SubplotSpec positions correspond to figure positions.

Examples

Example with large yticks labels:

fig, axs = plt.subplots(2, 1)
axs[0].plot(np.arange(0, 1000, 50))
axs[0].set_ylabel('YLabel 0')
axs[1].set_ylabel('YLabel 1')
fig.align_ylabels()
autofmt_xdate(bottom=0.2, rotation=30, ha='right', which='major')

Date ticklabels often overlap, so it is useful to rotate them and right align them. Also, a common use case is a number of subplots with shared x-axis where the x-axis is date data. The ticklabels are often long, and it helps to rotate them on the bottom subplot and turn them off on other subplots, as well as turn off xlabels.

Parameters:
bottomfloat, default: 0.2

The bottom of the subplots for subplots_adjust.

rotationfloat, default: 30 degrees

The rotation angle of the xtick labels in degrees.

ha{'left', 'center', 'right'}, default: 'right'

The horizontal alignment of the xticklabels.

which{'major', 'minor', 'both'}, default: 'major'

Selects which ticklabels to rotate.

property axes

List of Axes in the Figure. You can access and modify the Axes in the Figure through this list.

Do not modify the list itself. Instead, use "add_axes, add_subplot or delaxes to add or remove an Axes.

clear(keep_observers=False)[source]

Clear the figure -- synonym for clf.

clf(keep_observers=False)[source]

Clear the figure.

Set keep_observers to True if, for example, a gui widget is tracking the Axes in the figure.

colorbar(mappable, cax=None, ax=None, use_gridspec=True, **kw)

Add a colorbar to a plot.

Parameters:
mappable

The matplotlib.cm.ScalarMappable (i.e., AxesImage, ContourSet, etc.) described by this colorbar. This argument is mandatory for the Figure.colorbar method but optional for the pyplot.colorbar function, which sets the default to the current image.

Note that one can create a ScalarMappable "on-the-fly" to generate colorbars not attached to a previously drawn artist, e.g.

fig.colorbar(cm.ScalarMappable(norm=norm, cmap=cmap), ax=ax)
caxAxes, optional

Axes into which the colorbar will be drawn.

axAxes, list of Axes, optional

One or more parent axes from which space for a new colorbar axes will be stolen, if cax is None. This has no effect if cax is set.

use_gridspecbool, optional

If cax is None, a new cax is created as an instance of Axes. If ax is an instance of Subplot and use_gridspec is True, cax is created as an instance of Subplot using the gridspec module.

Returns:
colorbarColorbar

See also its base class, ColorbarBase.

Notes

Additional keyword arguments are of two kinds:

axes properties:

locationNone or {'left', 'right', 'top', 'bottom'}
The location, relative to the parent axes, where the colorbar axes is created. It also determines the orientation of the colorbar (colorbars on the left and right are vertical, colorbars at the top and bottom are horizontal). If None, the location will come from the orientation if it is set (vertical colorbars on the right, horizontal ones at the bottom), or default to 'right' if orientation is unset.
orientationNone or {'vertical', 'horizontal'}
The orientation of the colorbar. It is preferable to set the location of the colorbar, as that also determines the orientation; passing incompatible values for location and orientation raises an exception.
fractionfloat, default: 0.15
Fraction of original axes to use for colorbar.
shrinkfloat, default: 1.0
Fraction by which to multiply the size of the colorbar.
aspectfloat, default: 20
Ratio of long to short dimensions.
padfloat, default: 0.05 if vertical, 0.15 if horizontal
Fraction of original axes between colorbar and new image axes.
anchor(float, float), optional
The anchor point of the colorbar axes. Defaults to (0.0, 0.5) if vertical; (0.5, 1.0) if horizontal.
panchor(float, float), or False, optional
The anchor point of the colorbar parent axes. If False, the parent axes' anchor will be unchanged. Defaults to (1.0, 0.5) if vertical; (0.5, 0.0) if horizontal.

colorbar properties:

Property Description
extend {'neither', 'both', 'min', 'max'} If not 'neither', make pointed end(s) for out-of- range values. These are set for a given colormap using the colormap set_under and set_over methods.
extendfrac {None, 'auto', length, lengths} If set to None, both the minimum and maximum triangular colorbar extensions with have a length of 5% of the interior colorbar length (this is the default setting). If set to 'auto', makes the triangular colorbar extensions the same lengths as the interior boxes (when spacing is set to 'uniform') or the same lengths as the respective adjacent interior boxes (when spacing is set to 'proportional'). If a scalar, indicates the length of both the minimum and maximum triangular colorbar extensions as a fraction of the interior colorbar length. A two-element sequence of fractions may also be given, indicating the lengths of the minimum and maximum colorbar extensions respectively as a fraction of the interior colorbar length.
extendrect bool If False the minimum and maximum colorbar extensions will be triangular (the default). If True the extensions will be rectangular.
spacing {'uniform', 'proportional'} Uniform spacing gives each discrete color the same space; proportional makes the space proportional to the data interval.
ticks None or list of ticks or Locator If None, ticks are determined automatically from the input.
format None or str or Formatter If None, ScalarFormatter is used. If a format string is given, e.g., '%.3f', that is used. An alternative Formatter may be given instead.
drawedges bool Whether to draw lines at color boundaries.
label str The label on the colorbar's long axis.

The following will probably be useful only in the context of indexed colors (that is, when the mappable has norm=NoNorm()), or other unusual circumstances.

Property Description
boundaries None or a sequence
values None or a sequence which must be of length 1 less than the sequence of boundaries. For each region delimited by adjacent entries in boundaries, the colormapped to the corresponding value in values will be used.

If mappable is a ContourSet, its extend kwarg is included automatically.

The shrink kwarg provides a simple way to scale the colorbar with respect to the axes. Note that if cax is specified, it determines the size of the colorbar and shrink and aspect kwargs are ignored.

For more precise control, you can manually specify the positions of the axes objects in which the mappable and the colorbar are drawn. In this case, do not use any of the axes properties kwargs.

It is known that some vector graphics viewers (svg and pdf) renders white gaps between segments of the colorbar. This is due to bugs in the viewers, not Matplotlib. As a workaround, the colorbar can be rendered with overlapping segments:

cbar = colorbar()
cbar.solids.set_edgecolor("face")
draw()

However this has negative consequences in other circumstances, e.g. with semi-transparent images (alpha < 1) and colorbar extensions; therefore, this workaround is not used by default (see issue #1188).

contains(mouseevent)

Test whether the mouse event occurred on the figure.

Returns:
bool, {}
convert_xunits(x)

Convert x using the unit type of the xaxis.

If the artist is not in contained in an Axes or if the xaxis does not have units, x itself is returned.

convert_yunits(y)

Convert y using the unit type of the yaxis.

If the artist is not in contained in an Axes or if the yaxis does not have units, y itself is returned.

delaxes(ax)

Remove the Axes ax from the figure; update the current Axes.

property dpi

The resolution in dots per inch.

draw(renderer)[source]

Draw the Artist (and its children) using the given renderer.

This has no effect if the artist is not visible (Artist.get_visible returns False).

Parameters:
rendererRendererBase subclass.

Notes

This method is overridden in the Artist subclasses.

draw_artist(a)[source]

Draw Artist a only.

This method can only be used after an initial draw of the figure, because that creates and caches the renderer needed here.

execute_constrained_layout(renderer=None)[source]

Use layoutgrid to determine pos positions within Axes.

See also set_constrained_layout_pads.

figimage(X, xo=0, yo=0, alpha=None, norm=None, cmap=None, vmin=None, vmax=None, origin=None, resize=False, **kwargs)[source]

Add a non-resampled image to the figure.

The image is attached to the lower or upper left corner depending on origin.

Parameters:
X

The image data. This is an array of one of the following shapes:

  • MxN: luminance (grayscale) values
  • MxNx3: RGB values
  • MxNx4: RGBA values
xo, yoint

The x/y image offset in pixels.

alphaNone or float

The alpha blending value.

normmatplotlib.colors.Normalize

A Normalize instance to map the luminance to the interval [0, 1].

cmapstr or matplotlib.colors.Colormap, default: rcParams["image.cmap"] (default: 'viridis')

The colormap to use.

vmin, vmaxfloat

If norm is not given, these values set the data limits for the colormap.

origin{'upper', 'lower'}, default: rcParams["image.origin"] (default: 'upper')

Indicates where the [0, 0] index of the array is in the upper left or lower left corner of the axes.

resizebool

If True, resize the figure to match the given image size.

Returns:
matplotlib.image.FigureImage
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Additional kwargs are Artist kwargs passed on to FigureImage.

Notes

figimage complements the Axes image (imshow) which will be resampled to fit the current Axes. If you want a resampled image to fill the entire figure, you can define an Axes with extent [0, 0, 1, 1].

Examples

f = plt.figure()
nx = int(f.get_figwidth() * f.dpi)
ny = int(f.get_figheight() * f.dpi)
data = np.random.random((ny, nx))
f.figimage(data)
plt.show()
findobj(match=None, include_self=True)

Find artist objects.

Recursively find all Artist instances contained in the artist.

Parameters:
match

A filter criterion for the matches. This can be

  • None: Return all objects contained in artist.
  • A function with signature def match(artist: Artist) -> bool. The result will only contain artists for which the function returns True.
  • A class instance: e.g., Line2D. The result will only contain artists of this class or its subclasses (isinstance check).
include_selfbool

Include self in the list to be checked for a match.

Returns:
list of Artist
format_cursor_data(data)

Return a string representation of data.

Note

This method is intended to be overridden by artist subclasses. As an end-user of Matplotlib you will most likely not call this method yourself.

The default implementation converts ints and floats and arrays of ints and floats into a comma-separated string enclosed in square brackets.

See also

get_cursor_data
property frameon

Return the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.get_visible().

gca(**kwargs)

Get the current Axes, creating one if necessary.

The following kwargs are supported for ensuring the returned Axes adheres to the given projection etc., and for Axes creation if the active Axes does not exist:

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float
get_agg_filter()

Return filter function to be used for agg filter.

get_alpha()

Return the alpha value used for blending - not supported on all backends.

get_animated()

Return whether the artist is animated.

get_axes()[source]

Return a list of Axes in the Figure. You can access and modify the Axes in the Figure through this list.

Do not modify the list itself. Instead, use add_axes, add_subplot or delaxes to add or remove an Axes.

Note: This is equivalent to the property axes.

get_children()

Get a list of artists contained in the figure.

get_clip_box()

Return the clipbox.

get_clip_on()

Return whether the artist uses clipping.

get_clip_path()

Return the clip path.

get_constrained_layout()[source]

Return whether constrained layout is being used.

See Constrained Layout Guide.

get_constrained_layout_pads(relative=False)[source]

Get padding for constrained_layout.

Returns a list of w_pad, h_pad in inches and wspace and hspace as fractions of the subplot.

See Constrained Layout Guide.

Parameters:
relativebool

If True, then convert from inches to figure relative.

get_contains()

[Deprecated] Return the custom contains function of the artist if set, or None.

See also

set_contains

Notes

Deprecated since version 3.3.

get_cursor_data(event)

Return the cursor data for a given event.

Note

This method is intended to be overridden by artist subclasses. As an end-user of Matplotlib you will most likely not call this method yourself.

Cursor data can be used by Artists to provide additional context information for a given event. The default implementation just returns None.

Subclasses can override the method and return arbitrary data. However, when doing so, they must ensure that format_cursor_data can convert the data to a string representation.

The only current use case is displaying the z-value of an AxesImage in the status bar of a plot window, while moving the mouse.

Parameters:
eventmatplotlib.backend_bases.MouseEvent
get_default_bbox_extra_artists()
get_dpi()[source]

Return the resolution in dots per inch as a float.

get_edgecolor()

Get the edge color of the Figure rectangle.

get_facecolor()

Get the face color of the Figure rectangle.

get_figheight()[source]

Return the figure height in inches.

get_figure()

Return the Figure instance the artist belongs to.

get_figwidth()[source]

Return the figure width in inches.

get_frameon()

Return the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.get_visible().

get_gid()

Return the group id.

get_in_layout()

Return boolean flag, True if artist is included in layout calculations.

E.g. Constrained Layout Guide, Figure.tight_layout(), and fig.savefig(fname, bbox_inches='tight').

get_label()

Return the label used for this artist in the legend.

get_linewidth()

Get the line width of the Figure rectangle.

get_path_effects()
get_picker()

Return the picking behavior of the artist.

The possible values are described in set_picker.

See also

set_picker, pickable, pick
get_rasterized()

Return whether the artist is to be rasterized.

get_size_inches()[source]

Return the current size of the figure in inches.

Returns:
ndarray

The size (width, height) of the figure in inches.

Notes

The size in pixels can be obtained by multiplying with Figure.dpi.

get_sketch_params()

Return the sketch parameters for the artist.

Returns:
tuple or None

A 3-tuple with the following elements:

  • scale: The amplitude of the wiggle perpendicular to the source line.
  • length: The length of the wiggle along the line.
  • randomness: The scale factor by which the length is shrunken or expanded.

Returns None if no sketch parameters were set.

get_snap()

Return the snap setting.

See set_snap for details.

get_tight_layout()[source]

Return whether tight_layout is called when drawing.

get_tightbbox(renderer, bbox_extra_artists=None)

Return a (tight) bounding box of the figure in inches.

Artists that have artist.set_in_layout(False) are not included in the bbox.

Parameters:
rendererRendererBase subclass

renderer that will be used to draw the figures (i.e. fig.canvas.get_renderer())

bbox_extra_artistslist of Artist or None

List of artists to include in the tight bounding box. If None (default), then all artist children of each Axes are included in the tight bounding box.

Returns:
BboxBase

containing the bounding box (in figure inches).

get_transform()

Return the Transform instance used by this artist.

get_transformed_clip_path_and_affine()

Return the clip path with the non-affine part of its transformation applied, and the remaining affine part of its transformation.

get_url()

Return the url.

get_visible()

Return the visibility.

get_window_extent(*args, **kwargs)

Return the figure bounding box in display space. Arguments are ignored.

get_zorder()

Return the artist's zorder.

ginput(n=1, timeout=30, show_clicks=True, mouse_add=<MouseButton.LEFT: 1>, mouse_pop=<MouseButton.RIGHT: 3>, mouse_stop=<MouseButton.MIDDLE: 2>)[source]

Blocking call to interact with a figure.

Wait until the user clicks n times on the figure, and return the coordinates of each click in a list.

There are three possible interactions:

  • Add a point.
  • Remove the most recently added point.
  • Stop the interaction and return the points added so far.

The actions are assigned to mouse buttons via the arguments mouse_add, mouse_pop and mouse_stop.

Parameters:
nint, default: 1

Number of mouse clicks to accumulate. If negative, accumulate clicks until the input is terminated manually.

timeoutfloat, default: 30 seconds

Number of seconds to wait before timing out. If zero or negative will never timeout.

show_clicksbool, default: True

If True, show a red cross at the location of each click.

mouse_addMouseButton or None, default: MouseButton.LEFT

Mouse button used to add points.

mouse_popMouseButton or None, default: MouseButton.RIGHT

Mouse button used to remove the most recently added point.

mouse_stopMouseButton or None, default: MouseButton.MIDDLE

Mouse button used to stop input.

Returns:
list of tuples

A list of the clicked (x, y) coordinates.

Notes

The keyboard can also be used to select points in case your mouse does not have one or more of the buttons. The delete and backspace keys act like right clicking (i.e., remove last point), the enter key terminates input and any other key (not already used by the window manager) selects a point.

have_units()

Return whether units are set on any axis.

init_layoutgrid()[source]

Initialize the layoutgrid for use in constrained_layout.

is_transform_set()

Return whether the Artist has an explicitly set transform.

This is True after set_transform has been called.

legend(*args, **kwargs)

Place a legend on the figure.

Call signatures:

legend()
legend(labels)
legend(handles, labels)

The call signatures correspond to these three different ways to use this method:

1. Automatic detection of elements to be shown in the legend

The elements to be added to the legend are automatically determined, when you do not pass in any extra arguments.

In this case, the labels are taken from the artist. You can specify them either at artist creation or by calling the set_label() method on the artist:

ax.plot([1, 2, 3], label='Inline label')
fig.legend()

or:

line, = ax.plot([1, 2, 3])
line.set_label('Label via method')
fig.legend()

Specific lines can be excluded from the automatic legend element selection by defining a label starting with an underscore. This is default for all artists, so calling Figure.legend without any arguments and without setting the labels manually will result in no legend being drawn.

2. Labeling existing plot elements

To make a legend for all artists on all Axes, call this function with an iterable of strings, one for each legend item. For example:

fig, (ax1, ax2)  = plt.subplots(1, 2)
ax1.plot([1, 3, 5], color='blue')
ax2.plot([2, 4, 6], color='red')
fig.legend(['the blues', 'the reds'])

Note: This call signature is discouraged, because the relation between plot elements and labels is only implicit by their order and can easily be mixed up.

3. Explicitly defining the elements in the legend

For full control of which artists have a legend entry, it is possible to pass an iterable of legend artists followed by an iterable of legend labels respectively:

fig.legend([line1, line2, line3], ['label1', 'label2', 'label3'])
Parameters:
handleslist of Artist, optional

A list of Artists (lines, patches) to be added to the legend. Use this together with labels, if you need full control on what is shown in the legend and the automatic mechanism described above is not sufficient.

The length of handles and labels should be the same in this case. If they are not, they are truncated to the smaller length.

labelslist of str, optional

A list of labels to show next to the artists. Use this together with handles, if you need full control on what is shown in the legend and the automatic mechanism described above is not sufficient.

Returns:
Legend
Other Parameters:
locstr or pair of floats, default: rcParams["legend.loc"] (default: 'best') ('best' for axes, 'upper right' for figures)

The location of the legend.

The strings 'upper left', 'upper right', 'lower left', 'lower right' place the legend at the corresponding corner of the axes/figure.

The strings 'upper center', 'lower center', 'center left', 'center right' place the legend at the center of the corresponding edge of the axes/figure.

The string 'center' places the legend at the center of the axes/figure.

The string 'best' places the legend at the location, among the nine locations defined so far, with the minimum overlap with other drawn artists. This option can be quite slow for plots with large amounts of data; your plotting speed may benefit from providing a specific location.

The location can also be a 2-tuple giving the coordinates of the lower-left corner of the legend in axes coordinates (in which case bbox_to_anchor will be ignored).

For back-compatibility, 'center right' (but no other location) can also be spelled 'right', and each "string" locations can also be given as a numeric value:

Location String Location Code
'best' 0
'upper right' 1
'upper left' 2
'lower left' 3
'lower right' 4
'right' 5
'center left' 6
'center right' 7
'lower center' 8
'upper center' 9
'center' 10
bbox_to_anchorBboxBase, 2-tuple, or 4-tuple of floats

Box that is used to position the legend in conjunction with loc. Defaults to axes.bbox (if called as a method to Axes.legend) or figure.bbox (if Figure.legend). This argument allows arbitrary placement of the legend.

Bbox coordinates are interpreted in the coordinate system given by bbox_transform, with the default transform Axes or Figure coordinates, depending on which legend is called.

If a 4-tuple or BboxBase is given, then it specifies the bbox (x, y, width, height) that the legend is placed in. To put the legend in the best location in the bottom right quadrant of the axes (or figure):

loc='best', bbox_to_anchor=(0.5, 0., 0.5, 0.5)

A 2-tuple (x, y) places the corner of the legend specified by loc at x, y. For example, to put the legend's upper right-hand corner in the center of the axes (or figure) the following keywords can be used:

loc='upper right', bbox_to_anchor=(0.5, 0.5)
ncolint, default: 1

The number of columns that the legend has.

propNone or matplotlib.font_manager.FontProperties or dict

The font properties of the legend. If None (default), the current matplotlib.rcParams will be used.

fontsizeint or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}

The font size of the legend. If the value is numeric the size will be the absolute font size in points. String values are relative to the current default font size. This argument is only used if prop is not specified.

labelcolorstr or list

The color of the text in the legend. Either a valid color string (for example, 'red'), or a list of color strings. The labelcolor can also be made to match the color of the line or marker using 'linecolor', 'markerfacecolor' (or 'mfc'), or 'markeredgecolor' (or 'mec').

numpointsint, default: rcParams["legend.numpoints"] (default: 1)

The number of marker points in the legend when creating a legend entry for a Line2D (line).

scatterpointsint, default: rcParams["legend.scatterpoints"] (default: 1)

The number of marker points in the legend when creating a legend entry for a PathCollection (scatter plot).

scatteryoffsetsiterable of floats, default: [0.375, 0.5, 0.3125]

The vertical offset (relative to the font size) for the markers created for a scatter plot legend entry. 0.0 is at the base the legend text, and 1.0 is at the top. To draw all markers at the same height, set to [0.5].

markerscalefloat, default: rcParams["legend.markerscale"] (default: 1.0)

The relative size of legend markers compared with the originally drawn ones.

markerfirstbool, default: True

If True, legend marker is placed to the left of the legend label. If False, legend marker is placed to the right of the legend label.

frameonbool, default: rcParams["legend.frameon"] (default: True)

Whether the legend should be drawn on a patch (frame).

fancyboxbool, default: rcParams["legend.fancybox"] (default: True)

Whether round edges should be enabled around the FancyBboxPatch which makes up the legend's background.

shadowbool, default: rcParams["legend.shadow"] (default: False)

Whether to draw a shadow behind the legend.

framealphafloat, default: rcParams["legend.framealpha"] (default: 0.8)

The alpha transparency of the legend's background. If shadow is activated and framealpha is None, the default value is ignored.

facecolor"inherit" or color, default: rcParams["legend.facecolor"] (default: 'inherit')

The legend's background color. If "inherit", use rcParams["axes.facecolor"] (default: 'white').

edgecolor"inherit" or color, default: rcParams["legend.edgecolor"] (default: '0.8')

The legend's background patch edge color. If "inherit", use take rcParams["axes.edgecolor"] (default: 'black').

mode{"expand", None}

If mode is set to "expand" the legend will be horizontally expanded to fill the axes area (or bbox_to_anchor if defines the legend's size).

bbox_transformNone or matplotlib.transforms.Transform

The transform for the bounding box (bbox_to_anchor). For a value of None (default) the Axes' transAxes transform will be used.

titlestr or None

The legend's title. Default is no title (None).

title_fontsizeint or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}, default: rcParams["legend.title_fontsize"] (default: None)

The font size of the legend's title.

borderpadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.borderpad"] (default: 0.4)

The fractional whitespace inside the legend border, in font-size units.

labelspacingfloat, default: rcParams["legend.labelspacing"] (default: 0.5)

The vertical space between the legend entries, in font-size units.

handlelengthfloat, default: rcParams["legend.handlelength"] (default: 2.0)

The length of the legend handles, in font-size units.

handletextpadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.handletextpad"] (default: 0.8)

The pad between the legend handle and text, in font-size units.

borderaxespadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.borderaxespad"] (default: 0.5)

The pad between the axes and legend border, in font-size units.

columnspacingfloat, default: rcParams["legend.columnspacing"] (default: 2.0)

The spacing between columns, in font-size units.

handler_mapdict or None

The custom dictionary mapping instances or types to a legend handler. This handler_map updates the default handler map found at matplotlib.legend.Legend.get_legend_handler_map.

See also

Axes.legend

Notes

Some artists are not supported by this function. See Legend guide for details.

property mouseover

If this property is set to True, the artist will be queried for custom context information when the mouse cursor moves over it.

See also get_cursor_data(), ToolCursorPosition and NavigationToolbar2.

pchanged()

Call all of the registered callbacks.

This function is triggered internally when a property is changed.

pick(mouseevent)

Process a pick event.

Each child artist will fire a pick event if mouseevent is over the artist and the artist has picker set.

pickable()

Return whether the artist is pickable.

properties()

Return a dictionary of all the properties of the artist.

remove()

Remove the artist from the figure if possible.

The effect will not be visible until the figure is redrawn, e.g., with FigureCanvasBase.draw_idle. Call relim to update the axes limits if desired.

Note: relim will not see collections even if the collection was added to the axes with autolim = True.

Note: there is no support for removing the artist's legend entry.

remove_callback(oid)

Remove a callback based on its observer id.

See also

add_callback
savefig(fname, *, transparent=None, **kwargs)[source]

Save the current figure.

Call signature:

savefig(fname, dpi=None, facecolor='w', edgecolor='w',
        orientation='portrait', papertype=None, format=None,
        transparent=False, bbox_inches=None, pad_inches=0.1,
        frameon=None, metadata=None)

The available output formats depend on the backend being used.

Parameters:
fnamestr or path-like or binary file-like

A path, or a Python file-like object, or possibly some backend-dependent object such as matplotlib.backends.backend_pdf.PdfPages.

If format is set, it determines the output format, and the file is saved as fname. Note that fname is used verbatim, and there is no attempt to make the extension, if any, of fname match format, and no extension is appended.

If format is not set, then the format is inferred from the extension of fname, if there is one. If format is not set and fname has no extension, then the file is saved with rcParams["savefig.format"] (default: 'png') and the appropriate extension is appended to fname.

Other Parameters:
dpifloat or 'figure', default: rcParams["savefig.dpi"] (default: 'figure')

The resolution in dots per inch. If 'figure', use the figure's dpi value.

qualityint, default: rcParams["savefig.jpeg_quality"] (default: 95)

Applicable only if format is 'jpg' or 'jpeg', ignored otherwise.

The image quality, on a scale from 1 (worst) to 95 (best). Values above 95 should be avoided; 100 disables portions of the JPEG compression algorithm, and results in large files with hardly any gain in image quality.

This parameter is deprecated.

optimizebool, default: False

Applicable only if format is 'jpg' or 'jpeg', ignored otherwise.

Whether the encoder should make an extra pass over the image in order to select optimal encoder settings.

This parameter is deprecated.

progressivebool, default: False

Applicable only if format is 'jpg' or 'jpeg', ignored otherwise.

Whether the image should be stored as a progressive JPEG file.

This parameter is deprecated.

facecolorcolor or 'auto', default: rcParams["savefig.facecolor"] (default: 'auto')

The facecolor of the figure. If 'auto', use the current figure facecolor.

edgecolorcolor or 'auto', default: rcParams["savefig.edgecolor"] (default: 'auto')

The edgecolor of the figure. If 'auto', use the current figure edgecolor.

orientation{'landscape', 'portrait'}

Currently only supported by the postscript backend.

papertypestr

One of 'letter', 'legal', 'executive', 'ledger', 'a0' through 'a10', 'b0' through 'b10'. Only supported for postscript output.

formatstr

The file format, e.g. 'png', 'pdf', 'svg', ... The behavior when this is unset is documented under fname.

transparentbool

If True, the Axes patches will all be transparent; the figure patch will also be transparent unless facecolor and/or edgecolor are specified via kwargs. This is useful, for example, for displaying a plot on top of a colored background on a web page. The transparency of these patches will be restored to their original values upon exit of this function.

bbox_inchesstr or Bbox, default: rcParams["savefig.bbox"] (default: None)

Bounding box in inches: only the given portion of the figure is saved. If 'tight', try to figure out the tight bbox of the figure.

pad_inchesfloat, default: rcParams["savefig.pad_inches"] (default: 0.1)

Amount of padding around the figure when bbox_inches is 'tight'.

bbox_extra_artistslist of Artist, optional

A list of extra artists that will be considered when the tight bbox is calculated.

backendstr, optional

Use a non-default backend to render the file, e.g. to render a png file with the "cairo" backend rather than the default "agg", or a pdf file with the "pgf" backend rather than the default "pdf". Note that the default backend is normally sufficient. See The builtin backends for a list of valid backends for each file format. Custom backends can be referenced as "module://...".

metadatadict, optional

Key/value pairs to store in the image metadata. The supported keys and defaults depend on the image format and backend:

  • 'png' with Agg backend: See the parameter metadata of print_png.
  • 'pdf' with pdf backend: See the parameter metadata of PdfPages.
  • 'svg' with svg backend: See the parameter metadata of print_svg.
  • 'eps' and 'ps' with PS backend: Only 'Creator' is supported.
pil_kwargsdict, optional

Additional keyword arguments that are passed to PIL.Image.Image.save when saving the figure.

sca(a)

Set the current Axes to be a and return a.

set(**kwargs)

A property batch setter. Pass kwargs to set properties.

set_agg_filter(filter_func)

Set the agg filter.

Parameters:
filter_funccallable

A filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array.

set_alpha(alpha)

Set the alpha value used for blending - not supported on all backends.

Parameters:
alphascalar or None

alpha must be within the 0-1 range, inclusive.

set_animated(b)

Set whether the artist is intended to be used in an animation.

If True, the artist is excluded from regular drawing of the figure. You have to call Figure.draw_artist / Axes.draw_artist explicitly on the artist. This appoach is used to speed up animations using blitting.

See also matplotlib.animation and Faster rendering by using blitting.

Parameters:
bbool
set_canvas(canvas)[source]

Set the canvas that contains the figure

Parameters:
canvasFigureCanvas
set_clip_box(clipbox)

Set the artist's clip Bbox.

Parameters:
clipboxBbox
set_clip_on(b)

Set whether the artist uses clipping.

When False artists will be visible outside of the axes which can lead to unexpected results.

Parameters:
bbool
set_clip_path(path, transform=None)

Set the artist's clip path.

Parameters:
pathPatch or Path or TransformedPath or None

The clip path. If given a Path, transform must be provided as well. If None, a previously set clip path is removed.

transformTransform, optional

Only used if path is a Path, in which case the given Path is converted to a TransformedPath using transform.

Notes

For efficiency, if path is a Rectangle this method will set the clipping box to the corresponding rectangle and set the clipping path to None.

For technical reasons (support of set), a tuple (path, transform) is also accepted as a single positional parameter.

set_constrained_layout(constrained)[source]

Set whether constrained_layout is used upon drawing. If None, rcParams["figure.constrained_layout.use"] (default: False) value will be used.

When providing a dict containing the keys w_pad, h_pad the default constrained_layout paddings will be overridden. These pads are in inches and default to 3.0/72.0. w_pad is the width padding and h_pad is the height padding.

See Constrained Layout Guide.

Parameters:
constrainedbool or dict or None
set_constrained_layout_pads(**kwargs)[source]

Set padding for constrained_layout. Note the kwargs can be passed as a dictionary fig.set_constrained_layout(**paddict).

See Constrained Layout Guide.

Parameters:
w_padfloat

Width padding in inches. This is the pad around Axes and is meant to make sure there is enough room for fonts to look good. Defaults to 3 pts = 0.04167 inches

h_padfloat

Height padding in inches. Defaults to 3 pts.

wspacefloat

Width padding between subplots, expressed as a fraction of the subplot width. The total padding ends up being w_pad + wspace.

hspacefloat

Height padding between subplots, expressed as a fraction of the subplot width. The total padding ends up being h_pad + hspace.

set_contains(picker)

[Deprecated] Define a custom contains test for the artist.

The provided callable replaces the default contains method of the artist.

Parameters:
pickercallable

A custom picker function to evaluate if an event is within the artist. The function must have the signature:

def contains(artist: Artist, event: MouseEvent) -> bool, dict

that returns:

  • a bool indicating if the event is within the artist
  • a dict of additional information. The dict should at least return the same information as the default contains() implementation of the respective artist, but may provide additional information.

Notes

Deprecated since version 3.3.

set_dpi(val)[source]

Set the resolution of the figure in dots-per-inch.

Parameters:
valfloat
set_edgecolor(color)

Set the edge color of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
colorcolor
set_facecolor(color)

Set the face color of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
colorcolor
set_figheight(val, forward=True)[source]

Set the height of the figure in inches.

Parameters:
valfloat
forwardbool

See set_size_inches.

set_figure(fig)

Set the Figure instance the artist belongs to.

Parameters:
figFigure
set_figwidth(val, forward=True)[source]

Set the width of the figure in inches.

Parameters:
valfloat
forwardbool

See set_size_inches.

set_frameon(b)

Set the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.set_visible().

Parameters:
bbool
set_gid(gid)

Set the (group) id for the artist.

Parameters:
gidstr
set_in_layout(in_layout)

Set if artist is to be included in layout calculations, E.g. Constrained Layout Guide, Figure.tight_layout(), and fig.savefig(fname, bbox_inches='tight').

Parameters:
in_layoutbool
set_label(s)

Set a label that will be displayed in the legend.

Parameters:
sobject

s will be converted to a string by calling str.

set_linewidth(linewidth)

Set the line width of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
linewidthnumber
set_path_effects(path_effects)

Set the path effects.

Parameters:
path_effectsAbstractPathEffect
set_picker(picker)

Define the picking behavior of the artist.

Parameters:
pickerNone or bool or float or callable

This can be one of the following:

  • None: Picking is disabled for this artist (default).

  • A boolean: If True then picking will be enabled and the artist will fire a pick event if the mouse event is over the artist.

  • A float: If picker is a number it is interpreted as an epsilon tolerance in points and the artist will fire off an event if its data is within epsilon of the mouse event. For some artists like lines and patch collections, the artist may provide additional data to the pick event that is generated, e.g., the indices of the data within epsilon of the pick event

  • A function: If picker is callable, it is a user supplied function which determines whether the artist is hit by the mouse event:

    hit, props = picker(artist, mouseevent)
    

    to determine the hit test. if the mouse event is over the artist, return hit=True and props is a dictionary of properties you want added to the PickEvent attributes.

set_rasterized(rasterized)

Force rasterized (bitmap) drawing for vector graphics output.

Rasterized drawing is not supported by all artists. If you try to enable this on an artist that does not support it, the command has no effect and a warning will be issued.

This setting is ignored for pixel-based output.

See also Rasterization for vector graphics.

Parameters:
rasterizedbool
set_size_inches(w, h=None, forward=True)[source]

Set the figure size in inches.

Call signatures:

fig.set_size_inches(w, h)  # OR
fig.set_size_inches((w, h))
Parameters:
w(float, float) or float

Width and height in inches (if height not specified as a separate argument) or width.

hfloat

Height in inches.

forwardbool, default: True

If True, the canvas size is automatically updated, e.g., you can resize the figure window from the shell.

Notes

To transform from pixels to inches divide by Figure.dpi.

set_sketch_params(scale=None, length=None, randomness=None)

Set the sketch parameters.

Parameters:
scalefloat, optional

The amplitude of the wiggle perpendicular to the source line, in pixels. If scale is None, or not provided, no sketch filter will be provided.

lengthfloat, optional

The length of the wiggle along the line, in pixels (default 128.0)

randomnessfloat, optional

The scale factor by which the length is shrunken or expanded (default 16.0)

set_snap(snap)

Set the snapping behavior.

Snapping aligns positions with the pixel grid, which results in clearer images. For example, if a black line of 1px width was defined at a position in between two pixels, the resulting image would contain the interpolated value of that line in the pixel grid, which would be a grey value on both adjacent pixel positions. In contrast, snapping will move the line to the nearest integer pixel value, so that the resulting image will really contain a 1px wide black line.

Snapping is currently only supported by the Agg and MacOSX backends.

Parameters:
snapbool or None

Possible values:

  • True: Snap vertices to the nearest pixel center.
  • False: Do not modify vertex positions.
  • None: (auto) If the path contains only rectilinear line segments, round to the nearest pixel center.
set_tight_layout(tight)[source]

Set whether and how tight_layout is called when drawing.

Parameters:
tightbool or dict with keys "pad", "w_pad", "h_pad", "rect" or None

If a bool, sets whether to call tight_layout upon drawing. If None, use the figure.autolayout rcparam instead. If a dict, pass it as kwargs to tight_layout, overriding the default paddings.

set_transform(t)

Set the artist transform.

Parameters:
tTransform
set_url(url)

Set the url for the artist.

Parameters:
urlstr
set_visible(b)

Set the artist's visibility.

Parameters:
bbool
set_zorder(level)

Set the zorder for the artist. Artists with lower zorder values are drawn first.

Parameters:
levelfloat
show(warn=True)[source]

If using a GUI backend with pyplot, display the figure window.

If the figure was not created using figure, it will lack a FigureManagerBase, and this method will raise an AttributeError.

Warning

This does not manage an GUI event loop. Consequently, the figure may only be shown briefly or not shown at all if you or your environment are not managing an event loop.

Proper use cases for Figure.show include running this from a GUI application or an IPython shell.

If you're running a pure python shell or executing a non-GUI python script, you should use matplotlib.pyplot.show instead, which takes care of managing the event loop for you.

Parameters:
warnbool, default: True

If True and we are not running headless (i.e. on Linux with an unset DISPLAY), issue warning when called on a non-GUI backend.

property stale

Whether the artist is 'stale' and needs to be re-drawn for the output to match the internal state of the artist.

property sticky_edges

x and y sticky edge lists for autoscaling.

When performing autoscaling, if a data limit coincides with a value in the corresponding sticky_edges list, then no margin will be added--the view limit "sticks" to the edge. A typical use case is histograms, where one usually expects no margin on the bottom edge (0) of the histogram.

This attribute cannot be assigned to; however, the x and y lists can be modified in place as needed.

Examples

>>> artist.sticky_edges.x[:] = (xmin, xmax)
>>> artist.sticky_edges.y[:] = (ymin, ymax)
subfigures(nrows=1, ncols=1, squeeze=True, wspace=None, hspace=None, width_ratios=None, height_ratios=None, **kwargs)

Add a subfigure to this figure or subfigure.

A subfigure has the same artist methods as a figure, and is logically the same as a figure, but cannot print itself. See Figure subfigures.

Parameters:
nrows, ncolsint, default: 1

Number of rows/columns of the subfigure grid.

squeezebool, default: True

If True, extra dimensions are squeezed out from the returned array of subfigures.

wspace, hspacefloat, default: None

The amount of width/height reserved for space between subfigures, expressed as a fraction of the average subfigure width/height. If not given, the values will be inferred from a figure or rcParams when necessary.

width_ratiosarray-like of length ncols, optional

Defines the relative widths of the columns. Each column gets a relative width of width_ratios[i] / sum(width_ratios). If not given, all columns will have the same width.

height_ratiosarray-like of length nrows, optional

Defines the relative heights of the rows. Each row gets a relative height of height_ratios[i] / sum(height_ratios). If not given, all rows will have the same height.

subplot_mosaic(mosaic, *, subplot_kw=None, gridspec_kw=None, empty_sentinel='.')

Build a layout of Axes based on ASCII art or nested lists.

This is a helper function to build complex GridSpec layouts visually.

Note

This API is provisional and may be revised in the future based on early user feedback.

Parameters:
mosaiclist of list of {hashable or nested} or str

A visual layout of how you want your Axes to be arranged labeled as strings. For example

x = [['A panel', 'A panel', 'edge'],
     ['C panel', '.',       'edge']]

Produces 4 Axes:

  • 'A panel' which is 1 row high and spans the first two columns
  • 'edge' which is 2 rows high and is on the right edge
  • 'C panel' which in 1 row and 1 column wide in the bottom left
  • a blank space 1 row and 1 column wide in the bottom center

Any of the entries in the layout can be a list of lists of the same form to create nested layouts.

If input is a str, then it can either be a multi-line string of the form

'''
AAE
C.E
'''

where each character is a column and each line is a row. Or it can be a single-line string where rows are separated by ;:

'AB;CC'

The string notation allows only single character Axes labels and does not support nesting but is very terse.

subplot_kwdict, optional

Dictionary with keywords passed to the Figure.add_subplot call used to create each subplot.

gridspec_kwdict, optional

Dictionary with keywords passed to the GridSpec constructor used to create the grid the subplots are placed on.

empty_sentinelobject, optional

Entry in the layout to mean "leave this space empty". Defaults to '.'. Note, if layout is a string, it is processed via inspect.cleandoc to remove leading white space, which may interfere with using white-space as the empty sentinel.

Returns:
dict[label, Axes]

A dictionary mapping the labels to the Axes objects. The order of the axes is left-to-right and top-to-bottom of their position in the total layout.

subplots(nrows=1, ncols=1, *, sharex=False, sharey=False, squeeze=True, subplot_kw=None, gridspec_kw=None)

Add a set of subplots to this figure.

This utility wrapper makes it convenient to create common layouts of subplots in a single call.

Parameters:
nrows, ncolsint, default: 1

Number of rows/columns of the subplot grid.

sharex, shareybool or {'none', 'all', 'row', 'col'}, default: False

Controls sharing of properties among x (sharex) or y (sharey) axes:

  • True or 'all': x- or y-axis will be shared among all subplots.
  • False or 'none': each subplot x- or y-axis will be independent.
  • 'row': each subplot row will share an x- or y-axis.
  • 'col': each subplot column will share an x- or y-axis.

When subplots have a shared x-axis along a column, only the x tick labels of the bottom subplot are created. Similarly, when subplots have a shared y-axis along a row, only the y tick labels of the first column subplot are created. To later turn other subplots' ticklabels on, use tick_params.

When subplots have a shared axis that has units, calling Axis.set_units will update each axis with the new units.

squeezebool, default: True
  • If True, extra dimensions are squeezed out from the returned array of Axes:
    • if only one subplot is constructed (nrows=ncols=1), the resulting single Axes object is returned as a scalar.
    • for Nx1 or 1xM subplots, the returned object is a 1D numpy object array of Axes objects.
    • for NxM, subplots with N>1 and M>1 are returned as a 2D array.
  • If False, no squeezing at all is done: the returned Axes object is always a 2D array containing Axes instances, even if it ends up being 1x1.
subplot_kwdict, optional

Dict with keywords passed to the Figure.add_subplot call used to create each subplot.

gridspec_kwdict, optional

Dict with keywords passed to the GridSpec constructor used to create the grid the subplots are placed on.

Returns:
Axes or array of Axes

Either a single Axes object or an array of Axes objects if more than one subplot was created. The dimensions of the resulting array can be controlled with the squeeze keyword, see above.

Examples

# First create some toy data:
x = np.linspace(0, 2*np.pi, 400)
y = np.sin(x**2)

# Create a figure
plt.figure()

# Create a subplot
ax = fig.subplots()
ax.plot(x, y)
ax.set_title('Simple plot')

# Create two subplots and unpack the output array immediately
ax1, ax2 = fig.subplots(1, 2, sharey=True)
ax1.plot(x, y)
ax1.set_title('Sharing Y axis')
ax2.scatter(x, y)

# Create four polar Axes and access them through the returned array
axes = fig.subplots(2, 2, subplot_kw=dict(projection='polar'))
axes[0, 0].plot(x, y)
axes[1, 1].scatter(x, y)

# Share a X axis with each column of subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex='col')

# Share a Y axis with each row of subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharey='row')

# Share both X and Y axes with all subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex='all', sharey='all')

# Note that this is the same as
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex=True, sharey=True)
subplots_adjust(left=None, bottom=None, right=None, top=None, wspace=None, hspace=None)

Adjust the subplot layout parameters.

Unset parameters are left unmodified; initial values are given by rcParams["figure.subplot.[name]"].

Parameters:
leftfloat, optional

The position of the left edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

rightfloat, optional

The position of the right edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

bottomfloat, optional

The position of the bottom edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

topfloat, optional

The position of the top edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

wspacefloat, optional

The width of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes width.

hspacefloat, optional

The height of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes height.

suptitle(t, **kwargs)

Add a centered suptitle to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The suptitle text.

xfloat, default: 0.5

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.98

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: center

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: top

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the suptitle.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

supxlabel(t, **kwargs)

Add a centered supxlabel to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The supxlabel text.

xfloat, default: 0.5

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.01

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: center

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: bottom

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the supxlabel.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

supylabel(t, **kwargs)

Add a centered supylabel to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The supylabel text.

xfloat, default: 0.02

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.5

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: left

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: center

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the supylabel.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

text(x, y, s, fontdict=None, **kwargs)

Add text to figure.

Parameters:
x, yfloat

The position to place the text. By default, this is in figure coordinates, floats in [0, 1]. The coordinate system can be changed using the transform keyword.

sstr

The text string.

fontdictdict, optional

A dictionary to override the default text properties. If not given, the defaults are determined by rcParams["font.*"]. Properties passed as kwargs override the corresponding ones given in fontdict.

Returns:
Text
Other Parameters:
**kwargsText properties

Other miscellaneous text parameters.

Property Description
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
animated bool
backgroundcolor color
bbox dict with properties for patches.FancyBboxPatch
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
color or c color
contains unknown
figure Figure
fontfamily or family {FONTNAME, 'serif', 'sans-serif', 'cursive', 'fantasy', 'monospace'}
fontproperties or font or font_properties font_manager.FontProperties or str or pathlib.Path
fontsize or size float or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}
fontstretch or stretch {a numeric value in range 0-1000, 'ultra-condensed', 'extra-condensed', 'condensed', 'semi-condensed', 'normal', 'semi-expanded', 'expanded', 'extra-expanded', 'ultra-expanded'}
fontstyle or style {'normal', 'italic', 'oblique'}
fontvariant or variant {'normal', 'small-caps'}
fontweight or weight {a numeric value in range 0-1000, 'ultralight', 'light', 'normal', 'regular', 'book', 'medium', 'roman', 'semibold', 'demibold', 'demi', 'bold', 'heavy', 'extra bold', 'black'}
gid str
horizontalalignment or ha {'center', 'right', 'left'}
in_layout bool
label object
linespacing float (multiple of font size)
math_fontfamily str
multialignment or ma {'left', 'right', 'center'}
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position (float, float)
rasterized bool
rotation float or {'vertical', 'horizontal'}
rotation_mode {None, 'default', 'anchor'}
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
text object
transform Transform
transform_rotates_text bool
url str
usetex bool or None
verticalalignment or va {'center', 'top', 'bottom', 'baseline', 'center_baseline'}
visible bool
wrap bool
x float
y float
zorder float
tight_layout(*, pad=1.08, h_pad=None, w_pad=None, rect=None)[source]

Adjust the padding between and around subplots.

To exclude an artist on the Axes from the bounding box calculation that determines the subplot parameters (i.e. legend, or annotation), set a.set_in_layout(False) for that artist.

Parameters:
padfloat, default: 1.08

Padding between the figure edge and the edges of subplots, as a fraction of the font size.

h_pad, w_padfloat, default: pad

Padding (height/width) between edges of adjacent subplots, as a fraction of the font size.

recttuple (left, bottom, right, top), default: (0, 0, 1, 1)

A rectangle in normalized figure coordinates into which the whole subplots area (including labels) will fit.

update(props)

Update this artist's properties from the dict props.

Parameters:
propsdict
update_from(other)

Copy properties from other to self.

waitforbuttonpress(timeout=- 1)[source]

Blocking call to interact with the figure.

Wait for user input and return True if a key was pressed, False if a mouse button was pressed and None if no input was given within timeout seconds. Negative values deactivate timeout.

zorder = 0
class matplotlib.figure.FigureBase[source]

Base class for figure.Figure and figure.SubFigure containing the methods that add artists to the figure or subfigure, create Axes, etc.

add_artist(artist, clip=False)[source]

Add an Artist to the figure.

Usually artists are added to Axes objects using Axes.add_artist; this method can be used in the rare cases where one needs to add artists directly to the figure instead.

Parameters:
artistArtist

The artist to add to the figure. If the added artist has no transform previously set, its transform will be set to figure.transSubfigure.

clipbool, default: False

Whether the added artist should be clipped by the figure patch.

Returns:
Artist

The added artist.

add_axes(*args, **kwargs)[source]

Add an Axes to the figure.

Call signatures:

add_axes(rect, projection=None, polar=False, **kwargs)
add_axes(ax)
Parameters:
rectsequence of float

The dimensions [left, bottom, width, height] of the new Axes. All quantities are in fractions of figure width and height.

projection{None, 'aitoff', 'hammer', 'lambert', 'mollweide', 'polar', 'rectilinear', str}, optional

The projection type of the Axes. str is the name of a custom projection, see projections. The default None results in a 'rectilinear' projection.

polarbool, default: False

If True, equivalent to projection='polar'.

axes_classsubclass type of Axes, optional

The axes.Axes subclass that is instantiated. This parameter is incompatible with projection and polar. See axisartist for examples.

sharex, shareyAxes, optional

Share the x or y axis with sharex and/or sharey. The axis will have the same limits, ticks, and scale as the axis of the shared axes.

labelstr

A label for the returned Axes.

Returns:
Axes, or a subclass of Axes

The returned axes class depends on the projection used. It is Axes if rectilinear projection is used and projections.polar.PolarAxes if polar projection is used.

Other Parameters:
**kwargs

This method also takes the keyword arguments for the returned Axes class. The keyword arguments for the rectilinear Axes class Axes can be found in the following table but there might also be other keyword arguments if another projection is used, see the actual Axes class.

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float

Notes

In rare circumstances, add_axes may be called with a single argument, an Axes instance already created in the present figure but not in the figure's list of Axes.

Examples

Some simple examples:

rect = l, b, w, h
fig = plt.figure()
fig.add_axes(rect)
fig.add_axes(rect, frameon=False, facecolor='g')
fig.add_axes(rect, polar=True)
ax = fig.add_axes(rect, projection='polar')
fig.delaxes(ax)
fig.add_axes(ax)
add_callback(func)

Add a callback function that will be called whenever one of the Artist's properties changes.

Parameters:
funccallable

The callback function. It must have the signature:

def func(artist: Artist) -> Any

where artist is the calling Artist. Return values may exist but are ignored.

Returns:
int

The observer id associated with the callback. This id can be used for removing the callback with remove_callback later.

See also

remove_callback
add_gridspec(nrows=1, ncols=1, **kwargs)[source]

Return a GridSpec that has this figure as a parent. This allows complex layout of Axes in the figure.

Parameters:
nrowsint, default: 1

Number of rows in grid.

ncolsint, default: 1

Number or columns in grid.

Returns:
GridSpec
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Keyword arguments are passed to GridSpec.

Examples

Adding a subplot that spans two rows:

fig = plt.figure()
gs = fig.add_gridspec(2, 2)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(gs[0, 0])
ax2 = fig.add_subplot(gs[1, 0])
# spans two rows:
ax3 = fig.add_subplot(gs[:, 1])
add_subfigure(subplotspec, **kwargs)[source]

Add a SubFigure to the figure as part of a subplot arrangement.

Parameters:
subplotspecgridspec.SubplotSpec

Defines the region in a parent gridspec where the subfigure will be placed.

Returns:
figure.SubFigure
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Are passed to the SubFigure object.

add_subplot(*args, **kwargs)[source]

Add an Axes to the figure as part of a subplot arrangement.

Call signatures:

add_subplot(nrows, ncols, index, **kwargs)
add_subplot(pos, **kwargs)
add_subplot(ax)
add_subplot()
Parameters:
*argsint, (int, int, index), or SubplotSpec, default: (1, 1, 1)

The position of the subplot described by one of

  • Three integers (nrows, ncols, index). The subplot will take the index position on a grid with nrows rows and ncols columns. index starts at 1 in the upper left corner and increases to the right. index can also be a two-tuple specifying the (first, last) indices (1-based, and including last) of the subplot, e.g., fig.add_subplot(3, 1, (1, 2)) makes a subplot that spans the upper 2/3 of the figure.
  • A 3-digit integer. The digits are interpreted as if given separately as three single-digit integers, i.e. fig.add_subplot(235) is the same as fig.add_subplot(2, 3, 5). Note that this can only be used if there are no more than 9 subplots.
  • A SubplotSpec.

In rare circumstances, add_subplot may be called with a single argument, a subplot Axes instance already created in the present figure but not in the figure's list of Axes.

projection{None, 'aitoff', 'hammer', 'lambert', 'mollweide', 'polar', 'rectilinear', str}, optional

The projection type of the subplot (Axes). str is the name of a custom projection, see projections. The default None results in a 'rectilinear' projection.

polarbool, default: False

If True, equivalent to projection='polar'.

axes_classsubclass type of Axes, optional

The axes.Axes subclass that is instantiated. This parameter is incompatible with projection and polar. See axisartist for examples.

sharex, shareyAxes, optional

Share the x or y axis with sharex and/or sharey. The axis will have the same limits, ticks, and scale as the axis of the shared axes.

labelstr

A label for the returned Axes.

Returns:
axes.SubplotBase, or another subclass of Axes

The Axes of the subplot. The returned Axes base class depends on the projection used. It is Axes if rectilinear projection is used and projections.polar.PolarAxes if polar projection is used. The returned Axes is then a subplot subclass of the base class.

Other Parameters:
**kwargs

This method also takes the keyword arguments for the returned Axes base class; except for the figure argument. The keyword arguments for the rectilinear base class Axes can be found in the following table but there might also be other keyword arguments if another projection is used.

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float

Examples

fig = plt.figure()

fig.add_subplot(231)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(2, 3, 1)  # equivalent but more general

fig.add_subplot(232, frameon=False)  # subplot with no frame
fig.add_subplot(233, projection='polar')  # polar subplot
fig.add_subplot(234, sharex=ax1)  # subplot sharing x-axis with ax1
fig.add_subplot(235, facecolor="red")  # red subplot

ax1.remove()  # delete ax1 from the figure
fig.add_subplot(ax1)  # add ax1 back to the figure
align_labels(axs=None)[source]

Align the xlabels and ylabels of subplots with the same subplots row or column (respectively) if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list (or ndarray) of Axes to align the labels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

align_xlabels(axs=None)[source]

Align the xlabels of subplots in the same subplot column if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

If a label is on the bottom, it is aligned with labels on Axes that also have their label on the bottom and that have the same bottom-most subplot row. If the label is on the top, it is aligned with labels on Axes with the same top-most row.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list of (or ndarray) Axes to align the xlabels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

Notes

This assumes that axs are from the same GridSpec, so that their SubplotSpec positions correspond to figure positions.

Examples

Example with rotated xtick labels:

fig, axs = plt.subplots(1, 2)
for tick in axs[0].get_xticklabels():
    tick.set_rotation(55)
axs[0].set_xlabel('XLabel 0')
axs[1].set_xlabel('XLabel 1')
fig.align_xlabels()
align_ylabels(axs=None)[source]

Align the ylabels of subplots in the same subplot column if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

If a label is on the left, it is aligned with labels on Axes that also have their label on the left and that have the same left-most subplot column. If the label is on the right, it is aligned with labels on Axes with the same right-most column.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list (or ndarray) of Axes to align the ylabels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

Notes

This assumes that axs are from the same GridSpec, so that their SubplotSpec positions correspond to figure positions.

Examples

Example with large yticks labels:

fig, axs = plt.subplots(2, 1)
axs[0].plot(np.arange(0, 1000, 50))
axs[0].set_ylabel('YLabel 0')
axs[1].set_ylabel('YLabel 1')
fig.align_ylabels()
autofmt_xdate(bottom=0.2, rotation=30, ha='right', which='major')[source]

Date ticklabels often overlap, so it is useful to rotate them and right align them. Also, a common use case is a number of subplots with shared x-axis where the x-axis is date data. The ticklabels are often long, and it helps to rotate them on the bottom subplot and turn them off on other subplots, as well as turn off xlabels.

Parameters:
bottomfloat, default: 0.2

The bottom of the subplots for subplots_adjust.

rotationfloat, default: 30 degrees

The rotation angle of the xtick labels in degrees.

ha{'left', 'center', 'right'}, default: 'right'

The horizontal alignment of the xticklabels.

which{'major', 'minor', 'both'}, default: 'major'

Selects which ticklabels to rotate.

property axes

The Axes instance the artist resides in, or None.

colorbar(mappable, cax=None, ax=None, use_gridspec=True, **kw)[source]

Add a colorbar to a plot.

Parameters:
mappable

The matplotlib.cm.ScalarMappable (i.e., AxesImage, ContourSet, etc.) described by this colorbar. This argument is mandatory for the Figure.colorbar method but optional for the pyplot.colorbar function, which sets the default to the current image.

Note that one can create a ScalarMappable "on-the-fly" to generate colorbars not attached to a previously drawn artist, e.g.

fig.colorbar(cm.ScalarMappable(norm=norm, cmap=cmap), ax=ax)
caxAxes, optional

Axes into which the colorbar will be drawn.

axAxes, list of Axes, optional

One or more parent axes from which space for a new colorbar axes will be stolen, if cax is None. This has no effect if cax is set.

use_gridspecbool, optional

If cax is None, a new cax is created as an instance of Axes. If ax is an instance of Subplot and use_gridspec is True, cax is created as an instance of Subplot using the gridspec module.

Returns:
colorbarColorbar

See also its base class, ColorbarBase.

Notes

Additional keyword arguments are of two kinds:

axes properties:

locationNone or {'left', 'right', 'top', 'bottom'}
The location, relative to the parent axes, where the colorbar axes is created. It also determines the orientation of the colorbar (colorbars on the left and right are vertical, colorbars at the top and bottom are horizontal). If None, the location will come from the orientation if it is set (vertical colorbars on the right, horizontal ones at the bottom), or default to 'right' if orientation is unset.
orientationNone or {'vertical', 'horizontal'}
The orientation of the colorbar. It is preferable to set the location of the colorbar, as that also determines the orientation; passing incompatible values for location and orientation raises an exception.
fractionfloat, default: 0.15
Fraction of original axes to use for colorbar.
shrinkfloat, default: 1.0
Fraction by which to multiply the size of the colorbar.
aspectfloat, default: 20
Ratio of long to short dimensions.
padfloat, default: 0.05 if vertical, 0.15 if horizontal
Fraction of original axes between colorbar and new image axes.
anchor(float, float), optional
The anchor point of the colorbar axes. Defaults to (0.0, 0.5) if vertical; (0.5, 1.0) if horizontal.
panchor(float, float), or False, optional
The anchor point of the colorbar parent axes. If False, the parent axes' anchor will be unchanged. Defaults to (1.0, 0.5) if vertical; (0.5, 0.0) if horizontal.

colorbar properties:

Property Description
extend {'neither', 'both', 'min', 'max'} If not 'neither', make pointed end(s) for out-of- range values. These are set for a given colormap using the colormap set_under and set_over methods.
extendfrac {None, 'auto', length, lengths} If set to None, both the minimum and maximum triangular colorbar extensions with have a length of 5% of the interior colorbar length (this is the default setting). If set to 'auto', makes the triangular colorbar extensions the same lengths as the interior boxes (when spacing is set to 'uniform') or the same lengths as the respective adjacent interior boxes (when spacing is set to 'proportional'). If a scalar, indicates the length of both the minimum and maximum triangular colorbar extensions as a fraction of the interior colorbar length. A two-element sequence of fractions may also be given, indicating the lengths of the minimum and maximum colorbar extensions respectively as a fraction of the interior colorbar length.
extendrect bool If False the minimum and maximum colorbar extensions will be triangular (the default). If True the extensions will be rectangular.
spacing {'uniform', 'proportional'} Uniform spacing gives each discrete color the same space; proportional makes the space proportional to the data interval.
ticks None or list of ticks or Locator If None, ticks are determined automatically from the input.
format None or str or Formatter If None, ScalarFormatter is used. If a format string is given, e.g., '%.3f', that is used. An alternative Formatter may be given instead.
drawedges bool Whether to draw lines at color boundaries.
label str The label on the colorbar's long axis.

The following will probably be useful only in the context of indexed colors (that is, when the mappable has norm=NoNorm()), or other unusual circumstances.

Property Description
boundaries None or a sequence
values None or a sequence which must be of length 1 less than the sequence of boundaries. For each region delimited by adjacent entries in boundaries, the colormapped to the corresponding value in values will be used.

If mappable is a ContourSet, its extend kwarg is included automatically.

The shrink kwarg provides a simple way to scale the colorbar with respect to the axes. Note that if cax is specified, it determines the size of the colorbar and shrink and aspect kwargs are ignored.

For more precise control, you can manually specify the positions of the axes objects in which the mappable and the colorbar are drawn. In this case, do not use any of the axes properties kwargs.

It is known that some vector graphics viewers (svg and pdf) renders white gaps between segments of the colorbar. This is due to bugs in the viewers, not Matplotlib. As a workaround, the colorbar can be rendered with overlapping segments:

cbar = colorbar()
cbar.solids.set_edgecolor("face")
draw()

However this has negative consequences in other circumstances, e.g. with semi-transparent images (alpha < 1) and colorbar extensions; therefore, this workaround is not used by default (see issue #1188).

contains(mouseevent)[source]

Test whether the mouse event occurred on the figure.

Returns:
bool, {}
convert_xunits(x)

Convert x using the unit type of the xaxis.

If the artist is not in contained in an Axes or if the xaxis does not have units, x itself is returned.

convert_yunits(y)

Convert y using the unit type of the yaxis.

If the artist is not in contained in an Axes or if the yaxis does not have units, y itself is returned.

delaxes(ax)[source]

Remove the Axes ax from the figure; update the current Axes.

draw(renderer, *args, **kwargs)

Draw the Artist (and its children) using the given renderer.

This has no effect if the artist is not visible (Artist.get_visible returns False).

Parameters:
rendererRendererBase subclass.

Notes

This method is overridden in the Artist subclasses.

findobj(match=None, include_self=True)

Find artist objects.

Recursively find all Artist instances contained in the artist.

Parameters:
match

A filter criterion for the matches. This can be

  • None: Return all objects contained in artist.
  • A function with signature def match(artist: Artist) -> bool. The result will only contain artists for which the function returns True.
  • A class instance: e.g., Line2D. The result will only contain artists of this class or its subclasses (isinstance check).
include_selfbool

Include self in the list to be checked for a match.

Returns:
list of Artist
format_cursor_data(data)

Return a string representation of data.

Note

This method is intended to be overridden by artist subclasses. As an end-user of Matplotlib you will most likely not call this method yourself.

The default implementation converts ints and floats and arrays of ints and floats into a comma-separated string enclosed in square brackets.

See also

get_cursor_data
property frameon

Return the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.get_visible().

gca(**kwargs)[source]

Get the current Axes, creating one if necessary.

The following kwargs are supported for ensuring the returned Axes adheres to the given projection etc., and for Axes creation if the active Axes does not exist:

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float
get_agg_filter()

Return filter function to be used for agg filter.

get_alpha()

Return the alpha value used for blending - not supported on all backends.

get_animated()

Return whether the artist is animated.

get_children()[source]

Get a list of artists contained in the figure.

get_clip_box()

Return the clipbox.

get_clip_on()

Return whether the artist uses clipping.

get_clip_path()

Return the clip path.

get_contains()

[Deprecated] Return the custom contains function of the artist if set, or None.

See also

set_contains

Notes

Deprecated since version 3.3.

get_cursor_data(event)

Return the cursor data for a given event.

Note

This method is intended to be overridden by artist subclasses. As an end-user of Matplotlib you will most likely not call this method yourself.

Cursor data can be used by Artists to provide additional context information for a given event. The default implementation just returns None.

Subclasses can override the method and return arbitrary data. However, when doing so, they must ensure that format_cursor_data can convert the data to a string representation.

The only current use case is displaying the z-value of an AxesImage in the status bar of a plot window, while moving the mouse.

Parameters:
eventmatplotlib.backend_bases.MouseEvent
get_default_bbox_extra_artists()[source]
get_edgecolor()[source]

Get the edge color of the Figure rectangle.

get_facecolor()[source]

Get the face color of the Figure rectangle.

get_figure()

Return the Figure instance the artist belongs to.

get_frameon()[source]

Return the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.get_visible().

get_gid()

Return the group id.

get_in_layout()

Return boolean flag, True if artist is included in layout calculations.

E.g. Constrained Layout Guide, Figure.tight_layout(), and fig.savefig(fname, bbox_inches='tight').

get_label()

Return the label used for this artist in the legend.

get_linewidth()[source]

Get the line width of the Figure rectangle.

get_path_effects()
get_picker()

Return the picking behavior of the artist.

The possible values are described in set_picker.

See also

set_picker, pickable, pick
get_rasterized()

Return whether the artist is to be rasterized.

get_sketch_params()

Return the sketch parameters for the artist.

Returns:
tuple or None

A 3-tuple with the following elements:

  • scale: The amplitude of the wiggle perpendicular to the source line.
  • length: The length of the wiggle along the line.
  • randomness: The scale factor by which the length is shrunken or expanded.

Returns None if no sketch parameters were set.

get_snap()

Return the snap setting.

See set_snap for details.

get_tightbbox(renderer, bbox_extra_artists=None)[source]

Return a (tight) bounding box of the figure in inches.

Artists that have artist.set_in_layout(False) are not included in the bbox.

Parameters:
rendererRendererBase subclass

renderer that will be used to draw the figures (i.e. fig.canvas.get_renderer())

bbox_extra_artistslist of Artist or None

List of artists to include in the tight bounding box. If None (default), then all artist children of each Axes are included in the tight bounding box.

Returns:
BboxBase

containing the bounding box (in figure inches).

get_transform()

Return the Transform instance used by this artist.

get_transformed_clip_path_and_affine()

Return the clip path with the non-affine part of its transformation applied, and the remaining affine part of its transformation.

get_url()

Return the url.

get_visible()

Return the visibility.

get_window_extent(*args, **kwargs)[source]

Return the figure bounding box in display space. Arguments are ignored.

get_zorder()

Return the artist's zorder.

have_units()

Return whether units are set on any axis.

is_transform_set()

Return whether the Artist has an explicitly set transform.

This is True after set_transform has been called.

legend(*args, **kwargs)[source]

Place a legend on the figure.

Call signatures:

legend()
legend(labels)
legend(handles, labels)

The call signatures correspond to these three different ways to use this method:

1. Automatic detection of elements to be shown in the legend

The elements to be added to the legend are automatically determined, when you do not pass in any extra arguments.

In this case, the labels are taken from the artist. You can specify them either at artist creation or by calling the set_label() method on the artist:

ax.plot([1, 2, 3], label='Inline label')
fig.legend()

or:

line, = ax.plot([1, 2, 3])
line.set_label('Label via method')
fig.legend()

Specific lines can be excluded from the automatic legend element selection by defining a label starting with an underscore. This is default for all artists, so calling Figure.legend without any arguments and without setting the labels manually will result in no legend being drawn.

2. Labeling existing plot elements

To make a legend for all artists on all Axes, call this function with an iterable of strings, one for each legend item. For example:

fig, (ax1, ax2)  = plt.subplots(1, 2)
ax1.plot([1, 3, 5], color='blue')
ax2.plot([2, 4, 6], color='red')
fig.legend(['the blues', 'the reds'])

Note: This call signature is discouraged, because the relation between plot elements and labels is only implicit by their order and can easily be mixed up.

3. Explicitly defining the elements in the legend

For full control of which artists have a legend entry, it is possible to pass an iterable of legend artists followed by an iterable of legend labels respectively:

fig.legend([line1, line2, line3], ['label1', 'label2', 'label3'])
Parameters:
handleslist of Artist, optional

A list of Artists (lines, patches) to be added to the legend. Use this together with labels, if you need full control on what is shown in the legend and the automatic mechanism described above is not sufficient.

The length of handles and labels should be the same in this case. If they are not, they are truncated to the smaller length.

labelslist of str, optional

A list of labels to show next to the artists. Use this together with handles, if you need full control on what is shown in the legend and the automatic mechanism described above is not sufficient.

Returns:
Legend
Other Parameters:
locstr or pair of floats, default: rcParams["legend.loc"] (default: 'best') ('best' for axes, 'upper right' for figures)

The location of the legend.

The strings 'upper left', 'upper right', 'lower left', 'lower right' place the legend at the corresponding corner of the axes/figure.

The strings 'upper center', 'lower center', 'center left', 'center right' place the legend at the center of the corresponding edge of the axes/figure.

The string 'center' places the legend at the center of the axes/figure.

The string 'best' places the legend at the location, among the nine locations defined so far, with the minimum overlap with other drawn artists. This option can be quite slow for plots with large amounts of data; your plotting speed may benefit from providing a specific location.

The location can also be a 2-tuple giving the coordinates of the lower-left corner of the legend in axes coordinates (in which case bbox_to_anchor will be ignored).

For back-compatibility, 'center right' (but no other location) can also be spelled 'right', and each "string" locations can also be given as a numeric value:

Location String Location Code
'best' 0
'upper right' 1
'upper left' 2
'lower left' 3
'lower right' 4
'right' 5
'center left' 6
'center right' 7
'lower center' 8
'upper center' 9
'center' 10
bbox_to_anchorBboxBase, 2-tuple, or 4-tuple of floats

Box that is used to position the legend in conjunction with loc. Defaults to axes.bbox (if called as a method to Axes.legend) or figure.bbox (if Figure.legend). This argument allows arbitrary placement of the legend.

Bbox coordinates are interpreted in the coordinate system given by bbox_transform, with the default transform Axes or Figure coordinates, depending on which legend is called.

If a 4-tuple or BboxBase is given, then it specifies the bbox (x, y, width, height) that the legend is placed in. To put the legend in the best location in the bottom right quadrant of the axes (or figure):

loc='best', bbox_to_anchor=(0.5, 0., 0.5, 0.5)

A 2-tuple (x, y) places the corner of the legend specified by loc at x, y. For example, to put the legend's upper right-hand corner in the center of the axes (or figure) the following keywords can be used:

loc='upper right', bbox_to_anchor=(0.5, 0.5)
ncolint, default: 1

The number of columns that the legend has.

propNone or matplotlib.font_manager.FontProperties or dict

The font properties of the legend. If None (default), the current matplotlib.rcParams will be used.

fontsizeint or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}

The font size of the legend. If the value is numeric the size will be the absolute font size in points. String values are relative to the current default font size. This argument is only used if prop is not specified.

labelcolorstr or list

The color of the text in the legend. Either a valid color string (for example, 'red'), or a list of color strings. The labelcolor can also be made to match the color of the line or marker using 'linecolor', 'markerfacecolor' (or 'mfc'), or 'markeredgecolor' (or 'mec').

numpointsint, default: rcParams["legend.numpoints"] (default: 1)

The number of marker points in the legend when creating a legend entry for a Line2D (line).

scatterpointsint, default: rcParams["legend.scatterpoints"] (default: 1)

The number of marker points in the legend when creating a legend entry for a PathCollection (scatter plot).

scatteryoffsetsiterable of floats, default: [0.375, 0.5, 0.3125]

The vertical offset (relative to the font size) for the markers created for a scatter plot legend entry. 0.0 is at the base the legend text, and 1.0 is at the top. To draw all markers at the same height, set to [0.5].

markerscalefloat, default: rcParams["legend.markerscale"] (default: 1.0)

The relative size of legend markers compared with the originally drawn ones.

markerfirstbool, default: True

If True, legend marker is placed to the left of the legend label. If False, legend marker is placed to the right of the legend label.

frameonbool, default: rcParams["legend.frameon"] (default: True)

Whether the legend should be drawn on a patch (frame).

fancyboxbool, default: rcParams["legend.fancybox"] (default: True)

Whether round edges should be enabled around the FancyBboxPatch which makes up the legend's background.

shadowbool, default: rcParams["legend.shadow"] (default: False)

Whether to draw a shadow behind the legend.

framealphafloat, default: rcParams["legend.framealpha"] (default: 0.8)

The alpha transparency of the legend's background. If shadow is activated and framealpha is None, the default value is ignored.

facecolor"inherit" or color, default: rcParams["legend.facecolor"] (default: 'inherit')

The legend's background color. If "inherit", use rcParams["axes.facecolor"] (default: 'white').

edgecolor"inherit" or color, default: rcParams["legend.edgecolor"] (default: '0.8')

The legend's background patch edge color. If "inherit", use take rcParams["axes.edgecolor"] (default: 'black').

mode{"expand", None}

If mode is set to "expand" the legend will be horizontally expanded to fill the axes area (or bbox_to_anchor if defines the legend's size).

bbox_transformNone or matplotlib.transforms.Transform

The transform for the bounding box (bbox_to_anchor). For a value of None (default) the Axes' transAxes transform will be used.

titlestr or None

The legend's title. Default is no title (None).

title_fontsizeint or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}, default: rcParams["legend.title_fontsize"] (default: None)

The font size of the legend's title.

borderpadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.borderpad"] (default: 0.4)

The fractional whitespace inside the legend border, in font-size units.

labelspacingfloat, default: rcParams["legend.labelspacing"] (default: 0.5)

The vertical space between the legend entries, in font-size units.

handlelengthfloat, default: rcParams["legend.handlelength"] (default: 2.0)

The length of the legend handles, in font-size units.

handletextpadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.handletextpad"] (default: 0.8)

The pad between the legend handle and text, in font-size units.

borderaxespadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.borderaxespad"] (default: 0.5)

The pad between the axes and legend border, in font-size units.

columnspacingfloat, default: rcParams["legend.columnspacing"] (default: 2.0)

The spacing between columns, in font-size units.

handler_mapdict or None

The custom dictionary mapping instances or types to a legend handler. This handler_map updates the default handler map found at matplotlib.legend.Legend.get_legend_handler_map.

See also

Axes.legend

Notes

Some artists are not supported by this function. See Legend guide for details.

property mouseover

If this property is set to True, the artist will be queried for custom context information when the mouse cursor moves over it.

See also get_cursor_data(), ToolCursorPosition and NavigationToolbar2.

pchanged()

Call all of the registered callbacks.

This function is triggered internally when a property is changed.

pick(mouseevent)

Process a pick event.

Each child artist will fire a pick event if mouseevent is over the artist and the artist has picker set.

pickable()

Return whether the artist is pickable.

properties()

Return a dictionary of all the properties of the artist.

remove()

Remove the artist from the figure if possible.

The effect will not be visible until the figure is redrawn, e.g., with FigureCanvasBase.draw_idle. Call relim to update the axes limits if desired.

Note: relim will not see collections even if the collection was added to the axes with autolim = True.

Note: there is no support for removing the artist's legend entry.

remove_callback(oid)

Remove a callback based on its observer id.

See also

add_callback
sca(a)[source]

Set the current Axes to be a and return a.

set(**kwargs)

A property batch setter. Pass kwargs to set properties.

set_agg_filter(filter_func)

Set the agg filter.

Parameters:
filter_funccallable

A filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array.

set_alpha(alpha)

Set the alpha value used for blending - not supported on all backends.

Parameters:
alphascalar or None

alpha must be within the 0-1 range, inclusive.

set_animated(b)

Set whether the artist is intended to be used in an animation.

If True, the artist is excluded from regular drawing of the figure. You have to call Figure.draw_artist / Axes.draw_artist explicitly on the artist. This appoach is used to speed up animations using blitting.

See also matplotlib.animation and Faster rendering by using blitting.

Parameters:
bbool
set_clip_box(clipbox)

Set the artist's clip Bbox.

Parameters:
clipboxBbox
set_clip_on(b)

Set whether the artist uses clipping.

When False artists will be visible outside of the axes which can lead to unexpected results.

Parameters:
bbool
set_clip_path(path, transform=None)

Set the artist's clip path.

Parameters:
pathPatch or Path or TransformedPath or None

The clip path. If given a Path, transform must be provided as well. If None, a previously set clip path is removed.

transformTransform, optional

Only used if path is a Path, in which case the given Path is converted to a TransformedPath using transform.

Notes

For efficiency, if path is a Rectangle this method will set the clipping box to the corresponding rectangle and set the clipping path to None.

For technical reasons (support of set), a tuple (path, transform) is also accepted as a single positional parameter.

set_contains(picker)

[Deprecated] Define a custom contains test for the artist.

The provided callable replaces the default contains method of the artist.

Parameters:
pickercallable

A custom picker function to evaluate if an event is within the artist. The function must have the signature:

def contains(artist: Artist, event: MouseEvent) -> bool, dict

that returns:

  • a bool indicating if the event is within the artist
  • a dict of additional information. The dict should at least return the same information as the default contains() implementation of the respective artist, but may provide additional information.

Notes

Deprecated since version 3.3.

set_edgecolor(color)[source]

Set the edge color of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
colorcolor
set_facecolor(color)[source]

Set the face color of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
colorcolor
set_figure(fig)

Set the Figure instance the artist belongs to.

Parameters:
figFigure
set_frameon(b)[source]

Set the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.set_visible().

Parameters:
bbool
set_gid(gid)

Set the (group) id for the artist.

Parameters:
gidstr
set_in_layout(in_layout)

Set if artist is to be included in layout calculations, E.g. Constrained Layout Guide, Figure.tight_layout(), and fig.savefig(fname, bbox_inches='tight').

Parameters:
in_layoutbool
set_label(s)

Set a label that will be displayed in the legend.

Parameters:
sobject

s will be converted to a string by calling str.

set_linewidth(linewidth)[source]

Set the line width of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
linewidthnumber
set_path_effects(path_effects)

Set the path effects.

Parameters:
path_effectsAbstractPathEffect
set_picker(picker)

Define the picking behavior of the artist.

Parameters:
pickerNone or bool or float or callable

This can be one of the following:

  • None: Picking is disabled for this artist (default).

  • A boolean: If True then picking will be enabled and the artist will fire a pick event if the mouse event is over the artist.

  • A float: If picker is a number it is interpreted as an epsilon tolerance in points and the artist will fire off an event if its data is within epsilon of the mouse event. For some artists like lines and patch collections, the artist may provide additional data to the pick event that is generated, e.g., the indices of the data within epsilon of the pick event

  • A function: If picker is callable, it is a user supplied function which determines whether the artist is hit by the mouse event:

    hit, props = picker(artist, mouseevent)
    

    to determine the hit test. if the mouse event is over the artist, return hit=True and props is a dictionary of properties you want added to the PickEvent attributes.

set_rasterized(rasterized)

Force rasterized (bitmap) drawing for vector graphics output.

Rasterized drawing is not supported by all artists. If you try to enable this on an artist that does not support it, the command has no effect and a warning will be issued.

This setting is ignored for pixel-based output.

See also Rasterization for vector graphics.

Parameters:
rasterizedbool
set_sketch_params(scale=None, length=None, randomness=None)

Set the sketch parameters.

Parameters:
scalefloat, optional

The amplitude of the wiggle perpendicular to the source line, in pixels. If scale is None, or not provided, no sketch filter will be provided.

lengthfloat, optional

The length of the wiggle along the line, in pixels (default 128.0)

randomnessfloat, optional

The scale factor by which the length is shrunken or expanded (default 16.0)

set_snap(snap)

Set the snapping behavior.

Snapping aligns positions with the pixel grid, which results in clearer images. For example, if a black line of 1px width was defined at a position in between two pixels, the resulting image would contain the interpolated value of that line in the pixel grid, which would be a grey value on both adjacent pixel positions. In contrast, snapping will move the line to the nearest integer pixel value, so that the resulting image will really contain a 1px wide black line.

Snapping is currently only supported by the Agg and MacOSX backends.

Parameters:
snapbool or None

Possible values:

  • True: Snap vertices to the nearest pixel center.
  • False: Do not modify vertex positions.
  • None: (auto) If the path contains only rectilinear line segments, round to the nearest pixel center.
set_transform(t)

Set the artist transform.

Parameters:
tTransform
set_url(url)

Set the url for the artist.

Parameters:
urlstr
set_visible(b)

Set the artist's visibility.

Parameters:
bbool
set_zorder(level)

Set the zorder for the artist. Artists with lower zorder values are drawn first.

Parameters:
levelfloat
property stale

Whether the artist is 'stale' and needs to be re-drawn for the output to match the internal state of the artist.

property sticky_edges

x and y sticky edge lists for autoscaling.

When performing autoscaling, if a data limit coincides with a value in the corresponding sticky_edges list, then no margin will be added--the view limit "sticks" to the edge. A typical use case is histograms, where one usually expects no margin on the bottom edge (0) of the histogram.

This attribute cannot be assigned to; however, the x and y lists can be modified in place as needed.

Examples

>>> artist.sticky_edges.x[:] = (xmin, xmax)
>>> artist.sticky_edges.y[:] = (ymin, ymax)
subfigures(nrows=1, ncols=1, squeeze=True, wspace=None, hspace=None, width_ratios=None, height_ratios=None, **kwargs)[source]

Add a subfigure to this figure or subfigure.

A subfigure has the same artist methods as a figure, and is logically the same as a figure, but cannot print itself. See Figure subfigures.

Parameters:
nrows, ncolsint, default: 1

Number of rows/columns of the subfigure grid.

squeezebool, default: True

If True, extra dimensions are squeezed out from the returned array of subfigures.

wspace, hspacefloat, default: None

The amount of width/height reserved for space between subfigures, expressed as a fraction of the average subfigure width/height. If not given, the values will be inferred from a figure or rcParams when necessary.

width_ratiosarray-like of length ncols, optional

Defines the relative widths of the columns. Each column gets a relative width of width_ratios[i] / sum(width_ratios). If not given, all columns will have the same width.

height_ratiosarray-like of length nrows, optional

Defines the relative heights of the rows. Each row gets a relative height of height_ratios[i] / sum(height_ratios). If not given, all rows will have the same height.

subplot_mosaic(mosaic, *, subplot_kw=None, gridspec_kw=None, empty_sentinel='.')[source]

Build a layout of Axes based on ASCII art or nested lists.

This is a helper function to build complex GridSpec layouts visually.

Note

This API is provisional and may be revised in the future based on early user feedback.

Parameters:
mosaiclist of list of {hashable or nested} or str

A visual layout of how you want your Axes to be arranged labeled as strings. For example

x = [['A panel', 'A panel', 'edge'],
     ['C panel', '.',       'edge']]

Produces 4 Axes:

  • 'A panel' which is 1 row high and spans the first two columns
  • 'edge' which is 2 rows high and is on the right edge
  • 'C panel' which in 1 row and 1 column wide in the bottom left
  • a blank space 1 row and 1 column wide in the bottom center

Any of the entries in the layout can be a list of lists of the same form to create nested layouts.

If input is a str, then it can either be a multi-line string of the form

'''
AAE
C.E
'''

where each character is a column and each line is a row. Or it can be a single-line string where rows are separated by ;:

'AB;CC'

The string notation allows only single character Axes labels and does not support nesting but is very terse.

subplot_kwdict, optional

Dictionary with keywords passed to the Figure.add_subplot call used to create each subplot.

gridspec_kwdict, optional

Dictionary with keywords passed to the GridSpec constructor used to create the grid the subplots are placed on.

empty_sentinelobject, optional

Entry in the layout to mean "leave this space empty". Defaults to '.'. Note, if layout is a string, it is processed via inspect.cleandoc to remove leading white space, which may interfere with using white-space as the empty sentinel.

Returns:
dict[label, Axes]

A dictionary mapping the labels to the Axes objects. The order of the axes is left-to-right and top-to-bottom of their position in the total layout.

subplots(nrows=1, ncols=1, *, sharex=False, sharey=False, squeeze=True, subplot_kw=None, gridspec_kw=None)[source]

Add a set of subplots to this figure.

This utility wrapper makes it convenient to create common layouts of subplots in a single call.

Parameters:
nrows, ncolsint, default: 1

Number of rows/columns of the subplot grid.

sharex, shareybool or {'none', 'all', 'row', 'col'}, default: False

Controls sharing of properties among x (sharex) or y (sharey) axes:

  • True or 'all': x- or y-axis will be shared among all subplots.
  • False or 'none': each subplot x- or y-axis will be independent.
  • 'row': each subplot row will share an x- or y-axis.
  • 'col': each subplot column will share an x- or y-axis.

When subplots have a shared x-axis along a column, only the x tick labels of the bottom subplot are created. Similarly, when subplots have a shared y-axis along a row, only the y tick labels of the first column subplot are created. To later turn other subplots' ticklabels on, use tick_params.

When subplots have a shared axis that has units, calling Axis.set_units will update each axis with the new units.

squeezebool, default: True
  • If True, extra dimensions are squeezed out from the returned array of Axes:
    • if only one subplot is constructed (nrows=ncols=1), the resulting single Axes object is returned as a scalar.
    • for Nx1 or 1xM subplots, the returned object is a 1D numpy object array of Axes objects.
    • for NxM, subplots with N>1 and M>1 are returned as a 2D array.
  • If False, no squeezing at all is done: the returned Axes object is always a 2D array containing Axes instances, even if it ends up being 1x1.
subplot_kwdict, optional

Dict with keywords passed to the Figure.add_subplot call used to create each subplot.

gridspec_kwdict, optional

Dict with keywords passed to the GridSpec constructor used to create the grid the subplots are placed on.

Returns:
Axes or array of Axes

Either a single Axes object or an array of Axes objects if more than one subplot was created. The dimensions of the resulting array can be controlled with the squeeze keyword, see above.

Examples

# First create some toy data:
x = np.linspace(0, 2*np.pi, 400)
y = np.sin(x**2)

# Create a figure
plt.figure()

# Create a subplot
ax = fig.subplots()
ax.plot(x, y)
ax.set_title('Simple plot')

# Create two subplots and unpack the output array immediately
ax1, ax2 = fig.subplots(1, 2, sharey=True)
ax1.plot(x, y)
ax1.set_title('Sharing Y axis')
ax2.scatter(x, y)

# Create four polar Axes and access them through the returned array
axes = fig.subplots(2, 2, subplot_kw=dict(projection='polar'))
axes[0, 0].plot(x, y)
axes[1, 1].scatter(x, y)

# Share a X axis with each column of subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex='col')

# Share a Y axis with each row of subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharey='row')

# Share both X and Y axes with all subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex='all', sharey='all')

# Note that this is the same as
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex=True, sharey=True)
subplots_adjust(left=None, bottom=None, right=None, top=None, wspace=None, hspace=None)[source]

Adjust the subplot layout parameters.

Unset parameters are left unmodified; initial values are given by rcParams["figure.subplot.[name]"].

Parameters:
leftfloat, optional

The position of the left edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

rightfloat, optional

The position of the right edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

bottomfloat, optional

The position of the bottom edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

topfloat, optional

The position of the top edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

wspacefloat, optional

The width of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes width.

hspacefloat, optional

The height of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes height.

suptitle(t, **kwargs)[source]

Add a centered suptitle to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The suptitle text.

xfloat, default: 0.5

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.98

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: center

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: top

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the suptitle.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

supxlabel(t, **kwargs)[source]

Add a centered supxlabel to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The supxlabel text.

xfloat, default: 0.5

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.01

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: center

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: bottom

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the supxlabel.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

supylabel(t, **kwargs)[source]

Add a centered supylabel to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The supylabel text.

xfloat, default: 0.02

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.5

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: left

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: center

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the supylabel.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

text(x, y, s, fontdict=None, **kwargs)[source]

Add text to figure.

Parameters:
x, yfloat

The position to place the text. By default, this is in figure coordinates, floats in [0, 1]. The coordinate system can be changed using the transform keyword.

sstr

The text string.

fontdictdict, optional

A dictionary to override the default text properties. If not given, the defaults are determined by rcParams["font.*"]. Properties passed as kwargs override the corresponding ones given in fontdict.

Returns:
Text
Other Parameters:
**kwargsText properties

Other miscellaneous text parameters.

Property Description
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
animated bool
backgroundcolor color
bbox dict with properties for patches.FancyBboxPatch
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
color or c color
contains unknown
figure Figure
fontfamily or family {FONTNAME, 'serif', 'sans-serif', 'cursive', 'fantasy', 'monospace'}
fontproperties or font or font_properties font_manager.FontProperties or str or pathlib.Path
fontsize or size float or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}
fontstretch or stretch {a numeric value in range 0-1000, 'ultra-condensed', 'extra-condensed', 'condensed', 'semi-condensed', 'normal', 'semi-expanded', 'expanded', 'extra-expanded', 'ultra-expanded'}
fontstyle or style {'normal', 'italic', 'oblique'}
fontvariant or variant {'normal', 'small-caps'}
fontweight or weight {a numeric value in range 0-1000, 'ultralight', 'light', 'normal', 'regular', 'book', 'medium', 'roman', 'semibold', 'demibold', 'demi', 'bold', 'heavy', 'extra bold', 'black'}
gid str
horizontalalignment or ha {'center', 'right', 'left'}
in_layout bool
label object
linespacing float (multiple of font size)
math_fontfamily str
multialignment or ma {'left', 'right', 'center'}
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position (float, float)
rasterized bool
rotation float or {'vertical', 'horizontal'}
rotation_mode {None, 'default', 'anchor'}
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
text object
transform Transform
transform_rotates_text bool
url str
usetex bool or None
verticalalignment or va {'center', 'top', 'bottom', 'baseline', 'center_baseline'}
visible bool
wrap bool
x float
y float
zorder float
update(props)

Update this artist's properties from the dict props.

Parameters:
propsdict
update_from(other)

Copy properties from other to self.

zorder = 0
class matplotlib.figure.SubFigure(parent, subplotspec, *, facecolor=None, edgecolor=None, linewidth=0.0, frameon=None)[source]

Logical figure that can be placed inside a figure.

Typically instantiated using Figure.add_subfigure or SubFigure.add_subfigure, or SubFigure.subfigures. A subfigure has the same methods as a figure except for those particularly tied to the size or dpi of the figure, and is confined to a prescribed region of the figure. For example the following puts two subfigures side-by-side:

fig = plt.figure()
sfigs = fig.subfigures(1, 2)
axsL = sfigs[0].subplots(1, 2)
axsR = sfigs[1].subplots(2, 1)

See Figure subfigures

Parameters:
parentfigure.Figure or figure.SubFigure

Figure or subfigure that contains the SubFigure. SubFigures can be nested.

subplotspecgridspec.SubplotSpec

Defines the region in a parent gridspec where the subfigure will be placed.

facecolordefault: rcParams["figure.facecolor"] (default: 'white')

The figure patch face color.

edgecolordefault: rcParams["figure.edgecolor"] (default: 'white')

The figure patch edge color.

linewidthfloat

The linewidth of the frame (i.e. the edge linewidth of the figure patch).

frameonbool, default: rcParams["figure.frameon"] (default: True)

If False, suppress drawing the figure background patch.

add_artist(artist, clip=False)

Add an Artist to the figure.

Usually artists are added to Axes objects using Axes.add_artist; this method can be used in the rare cases where one needs to add artists directly to the figure instead.

Parameters:
artistArtist

The artist to add to the figure. If the added artist has no transform previously set, its transform will be set to figure.transSubfigure.

clipbool, default: False

Whether the added artist should be clipped by the figure patch.

Returns:
Artist

The added artist.

add_axes(*args, **kwargs)

Add an Axes to the figure.

Call signatures:

add_axes(rect, projection=None, polar=False, **kwargs)
add_axes(ax)
Parameters:
rectsequence of float

The dimensions [left, bottom, width, height] of the new Axes. All quantities are in fractions of figure width and height.

projection{None, 'aitoff', 'hammer', 'lambert', 'mollweide', 'polar', 'rectilinear', str}, optional

The projection type of the Axes. str is the name of a custom projection, see projections. The default None results in a 'rectilinear' projection.

polarbool, default: False

If True, equivalent to projection='polar'.

axes_classsubclass type of Axes, optional

The axes.Axes subclass that is instantiated. This parameter is incompatible with projection and polar. See axisartist for examples.

sharex, shareyAxes, optional

Share the x or y axis with sharex and/or sharey. The axis will have the same limits, ticks, and scale as the axis of the shared axes.

labelstr

A label for the returned Axes.

Returns:
Axes, or a subclass of Axes

The returned axes class depends on the projection used. It is Axes if rectilinear projection is used and projections.polar.PolarAxes if polar projection is used.

Other Parameters:
**kwargs

This method also takes the keyword arguments for the returned Axes class. The keyword arguments for the rectilinear Axes class Axes can be found in the following table but there might also be other keyword arguments if another projection is used, see the actual Axes class.

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float

Notes

In rare circumstances, add_axes may be called with a single argument, an Axes instance already created in the present figure but not in the figure's list of Axes.

Examples

Some simple examples:

rect = l, b, w, h
fig = plt.figure()
fig.add_axes(rect)
fig.add_axes(rect, frameon=False, facecolor='g')
fig.add_axes(rect, polar=True)
ax = fig.add_axes(rect, projection='polar')
fig.delaxes(ax)
fig.add_axes(ax)
add_callback(func)

Add a callback function that will be called whenever one of the Artist's properties changes.

Parameters:
funccallable

The callback function. It must have the signature:

def func(artist: Artist) -> Any

where artist is the calling Artist. Return values may exist but are ignored.

Returns:
int

The observer id associated with the callback. This id can be used for removing the callback with remove_callback later.

See also

remove_callback
add_gridspec(nrows=1, ncols=1, **kwargs)

Return a GridSpec that has this figure as a parent. This allows complex layout of Axes in the figure.

Parameters:
nrowsint, default: 1

Number of rows in grid.

ncolsint, default: 1

Number or columns in grid.

Returns:
GridSpec
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Keyword arguments are passed to GridSpec.

Examples

Adding a subplot that spans two rows:

fig = plt.figure()
gs = fig.add_gridspec(2, 2)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(gs[0, 0])
ax2 = fig.add_subplot(gs[1, 0])
# spans two rows:
ax3 = fig.add_subplot(gs[:, 1])
add_subfigure(subplotspec, **kwargs)

Add a SubFigure to the figure as part of a subplot arrangement.

Parameters:
subplotspecgridspec.SubplotSpec

Defines the region in a parent gridspec where the subfigure will be placed.

Returns:
figure.SubFigure
Other Parameters:
**kwargs

Are passed to the SubFigure object.

add_subplot(*args, **kwargs)

Add an Axes to the figure as part of a subplot arrangement.

Call signatures:

add_subplot(nrows, ncols, index, **kwargs)
add_subplot(pos, **kwargs)
add_subplot(ax)
add_subplot()
Parameters:
*argsint, (int, int, index), or SubplotSpec, default: (1, 1, 1)

The position of the subplot described by one of

  • Three integers (nrows, ncols, index). The subplot will take the index position on a grid with nrows rows and ncols columns. index starts at 1 in the upper left corner and increases to the right. index can also be a two-tuple specifying the (first, last) indices (1-based, and including last) of the subplot, e.g., fig.add_subplot(3, 1, (1, 2)) makes a subplot that spans the upper 2/3 of the figure.
  • A 3-digit integer. The digits are interpreted as if given separately as three single-digit integers, i.e. fig.add_subplot(235) is the same as fig.add_subplot(2, 3, 5). Note that this can only be used if there are no more than 9 subplots.
  • A SubplotSpec.

In rare circumstances, add_subplot may be called with a single argument, a subplot Axes instance already created in the present figure but not in the figure's list of Axes.

projection{None, 'aitoff', 'hammer', 'lambert', 'mollweide', 'polar', 'rectilinear', str}, optional

The projection type of the subplot (Axes). str is the name of a custom projection, see projections. The default None results in a 'rectilinear' projection.

polarbool, default: False

If True, equivalent to projection='polar'.

axes_classsubclass type of Axes, optional

The axes.Axes subclass that is instantiated. This parameter is incompatible with projection and polar. See axisartist for examples.

sharex, shareyAxes, optional

Share the x or y axis with sharex and/or sharey. The axis will have the same limits, ticks, and scale as the axis of the shared axes.

labelstr

A label for the returned Axes.

Returns:
axes.SubplotBase, or another subclass of Axes

The Axes of the subplot. The returned Axes base class depends on the projection used. It is Axes if rectilinear projection is used and projections.polar.PolarAxes if polar projection is used. The returned Axes is then a subplot subclass of the base class.

Other Parameters:
**kwargs

This method also takes the keyword arguments for the returned Axes base class; except for the figure argument. The keyword arguments for the rectilinear base class Axes can be found in the following table but there might also be other keyword arguments if another projection is used.

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float

Examples

fig = plt.figure()

fig.add_subplot(231)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(2, 3, 1)  # equivalent but more general

fig.add_subplot(232, frameon=False)  # subplot with no frame
fig.add_subplot(233, projection='polar')  # polar subplot
fig.add_subplot(234, sharex=ax1)  # subplot sharing x-axis with ax1
fig.add_subplot(235, facecolor="red")  # red subplot

ax1.remove()  # delete ax1 from the figure
fig.add_subplot(ax1)  # add ax1 back to the figure
align_labels(axs=None)

Align the xlabels and ylabels of subplots with the same subplots row or column (respectively) if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list (or ndarray) of Axes to align the labels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

align_xlabels(axs=None)

Align the xlabels of subplots in the same subplot column if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

If a label is on the bottom, it is aligned with labels on Axes that also have their label on the bottom and that have the same bottom-most subplot row. If the label is on the top, it is aligned with labels on Axes with the same top-most row.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list of (or ndarray) Axes to align the xlabels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

Notes

This assumes that axs are from the same GridSpec, so that their SubplotSpec positions correspond to figure positions.

Examples

Example with rotated xtick labels:

fig, axs = plt.subplots(1, 2)
for tick in axs[0].get_xticklabels():
    tick.set_rotation(55)
axs[0].set_xlabel('XLabel 0')
axs[1].set_xlabel('XLabel 1')
fig.align_xlabels()
align_ylabels(axs=None)

Align the ylabels of subplots in the same subplot column if label alignment is being done automatically (i.e. the label position is not manually set).

Alignment persists for draw events after this is called.

If a label is on the left, it is aligned with labels on Axes that also have their label on the left and that have the same left-most subplot column. If the label is on the right, it is aligned with labels on Axes with the same right-most column.

Parameters:
axslist of Axes

Optional list (or ndarray) of Axes to align the ylabels. Default is to align all Axes on the figure.

Notes

This assumes that axs are from the same GridSpec, so that their SubplotSpec positions correspond to figure positions.

Examples

Example with large yticks labels:

fig, axs = plt.subplots(2, 1)
axs[0].plot(np.arange(0, 1000, 50))
axs[0].set_ylabel('YLabel 0')
axs[1].set_ylabel('YLabel 1')
fig.align_ylabels()
autofmt_xdate(bottom=0.2, rotation=30, ha='right', which='major')

Date ticklabels often overlap, so it is useful to rotate them and right align them. Also, a common use case is a number of subplots with shared x-axis where the x-axis is date data. The ticklabels are often long, and it helps to rotate them on the bottom subplot and turn them off on other subplots, as well as turn off xlabels.

Parameters:
bottomfloat, default: 0.2

The bottom of the subplots for subplots_adjust.

rotationfloat, default: 30 degrees

The rotation angle of the xtick labels in degrees.

ha{'left', 'center', 'right'}, default: 'right'

The horizontal alignment of the xticklabels.

which{'major', 'minor', 'both'}, default: 'major'

Selects which ticklabels to rotate.

property axes

List of Axes in the SubFigure. You can access and modify the Axes in the SubFigure through this list.

Do not modify the list itself. Instead, use add_axes, add_subplot or delaxes to add or remove an Axes.

colorbar(mappable, cax=None, ax=None, use_gridspec=True, **kw)

Add a colorbar to a plot.

Parameters:
mappable

The matplotlib.cm.ScalarMappable (i.e., AxesImage, ContourSet, etc.) described by this colorbar. This argument is mandatory for the Figure.colorbar method but optional for the pyplot.colorbar function, which sets the default to the current image.

Note that one can create a ScalarMappable "on-the-fly" to generate colorbars not attached to a previously drawn artist, e.g.

fig.colorbar(cm.ScalarMappable(norm=norm, cmap=cmap), ax=ax)
caxAxes, optional

Axes into which the colorbar will be drawn.

axAxes, list of Axes, optional

One or more parent axes from which space for a new colorbar axes will be stolen, if cax is None. This has no effect if cax is set.

use_gridspecbool, optional

If cax is None, a new cax is created as an instance of Axes. If ax is an instance of Subplot and use_gridspec is True, cax is created as an instance of Subplot using the gridspec module.

Returns:
colorbarColorbar

See also its base class, ColorbarBase.

Notes

Additional keyword arguments are of two kinds:

axes properties:

locationNone or {'left', 'right', 'top', 'bottom'}
The location, relative to the parent axes, where the colorbar axes is created. It also determines the orientation of the colorbar (colorbars on the left and right are vertical, colorbars at the top and bottom are horizontal). If None, the location will come from the orientation if it is set (vertical colorbars on the right, horizontal ones at the bottom), or default to 'right' if orientation is unset.
orientationNone or {'vertical', 'horizontal'}
The orientation of the colorbar. It is preferable to set the location of the colorbar, as that also determines the orientation; passing incompatible values for location and orientation raises an exception.
fractionfloat, default: 0.15
Fraction of original axes to use for colorbar.
shrinkfloat, default: 1.0
Fraction by which to multiply the size of the colorbar.
aspectfloat, default: 20
Ratio of long to short dimensions.
padfloat, default: 0.05 if vertical, 0.15 if horizontal
Fraction of original axes between colorbar and new image axes.
anchor(float, float), optional
The anchor point of the colorbar axes. Defaults to (0.0, 0.5) if vertical; (0.5, 1.0) if horizontal.
panchor(float, float), or False, optional
The anchor point of the colorbar parent axes. If False, the parent axes' anchor will be unchanged. Defaults to (1.0, 0.5) if vertical; (0.5, 0.0) if horizontal.

colorbar properties:

Property Description
extend {'neither', 'both', 'min', 'max'} If not 'neither', make pointed end(s) for out-of- range values. These are set for a given colormap using the colormap set_under and set_over methods.
extendfrac {None, 'auto', length, lengths} If set to None, both the minimum and maximum triangular colorbar extensions with have a length of 5% of the interior colorbar length (this is the default setting). If set to 'auto', makes the triangular colorbar extensions the same lengths as the interior boxes (when spacing is set to 'uniform') or the same lengths as the respective adjacent interior boxes (when spacing is set to 'proportional'). If a scalar, indicates the length of both the minimum and maximum triangular colorbar extensions as a fraction of the interior colorbar length. A two-element sequence of fractions may also be given, indicating the lengths of the minimum and maximum colorbar extensions respectively as a fraction of the interior colorbar length.
extendrect bool If False the minimum and maximum colorbar extensions will be triangular (the default). If True the extensions will be rectangular.
spacing {'uniform', 'proportional'} Uniform spacing gives each discrete color the same space; proportional makes the space proportional to the data interval.
ticks None or list of ticks or Locator If None, ticks are determined automatically from the input.
format None or str or Formatter If None, ScalarFormatter is used. If a format string is given, e.g., '%.3f', that is used. An alternative Formatter may be given instead.
drawedges bool Whether to draw lines at color boundaries.
label str The label on the colorbar's long axis.

The following will probably be useful only in the context of indexed colors (that is, when the mappable has norm=NoNorm()), or other unusual circumstances.

Property Description
boundaries None or a sequence
values None or a sequence which must be of length 1 less than the sequence of boundaries. For each region delimited by adjacent entries in boundaries, the colormapped to the corresponding value in values will be used.

If mappable is a ContourSet, its extend kwarg is included automatically.

The shrink kwarg provides a simple way to scale the colorbar with respect to the axes. Note that if cax is specified, it determines the size of the colorbar and shrink and aspect kwargs are ignored.

For more precise control, you can manually specify the positions of the axes objects in which the mappable and the colorbar are drawn. In this case, do not use any of the axes properties kwargs.

It is known that some vector graphics viewers (svg and pdf) renders white gaps between segments of the colorbar. This is due to bugs in the viewers, not Matplotlib. As a workaround, the colorbar can be rendered with overlapping segments:

cbar = colorbar()
cbar.solids.set_edgecolor("face")
draw()

However this has negative consequences in other circumstances, e.g. with semi-transparent images (alpha < 1) and colorbar extensions; therefore, this workaround is not used by default (see issue #1188).

contains(mouseevent)

Test whether the mouse event occurred on the figure.

Returns:
bool, {}
convert_xunits(x)

Convert x using the unit type of the xaxis.

If the artist is not in contained in an Axes or if the xaxis does not have units, x itself is returned.

convert_yunits(y)

Convert y using the unit type of the yaxis.

If the artist is not in contained in an Axes or if the yaxis does not have units, y itself is returned.

delaxes(ax)

Remove the Axes ax from the figure; update the current Axes.

property dpi
draw(renderer)[source]

Draw the Artist (and its children) using the given renderer.

This has no effect if the artist is not visible (Artist.get_visible returns False).

Parameters:
rendererRendererBase subclass.

Notes

This method is overridden in the Artist subclasses.

findobj(match=None, include_self=True)

Find artist objects.

Recursively find all Artist instances contained in the artist.

Parameters:
match

A filter criterion for the matches. This can be

  • None: Return all objects contained in artist.
  • A function with signature def match(artist: Artist) -> bool. The result will only contain artists for which the function returns True.
  • A class instance: e.g., Line2D. The result will only contain artists of this class or its subclasses (isinstance check).
include_selfbool

Include self in the list to be checked for a match.

Returns:
list of Artist
format_cursor_data(data)

Return a string representation of data.

Note

This method is intended to be overridden by artist subclasses. As an end-user of Matplotlib you will most likely not call this method yourself.

The default implementation converts ints and floats and arrays of ints and floats into a comma-separated string enclosed in square brackets.

See also

get_cursor_data
property frameon

Return the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.get_visible().

gca(**kwargs)

Get the current Axes, creating one if necessary.

The following kwargs are supported for ensuring the returned Axes adheres to the given projection etc., and for Axes creation if the active Axes does not exist:

Property Description
adjustable {'box', 'datalim'}
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
anchor 2-tuple of floats or {'C', 'SW', 'S', 'SE', ...}
animated bool
aspect {'auto', 'equal'} or float
autoscale_on bool
autoscalex_on bool
autoscaley_on bool
axes_locator Callable[[Axes, Renderer], Bbox]
axisbelow bool or 'line'
box_aspect float or None
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
contains unknown
facecolor or fc color
figure Figure
frame_on bool
gid str
in_layout bool
label object
navigate bool
navigate_mode unknown
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position [left, bottom, width, height] or Bbox
prop_cycle unknown
rasterization_zorder float or None
rasterized bool
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
title str
transform Transform
url str
visible bool
xbound unknown
xlabel str
xlim (bottom: float, top: float)
xmargin float greater than -0.5
xscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
xticklabels unknown
xticks unknown
ybound unknown
ylabel str
ylim (bottom: float, top: float)
ymargin float greater than -0.5
yscale {"linear", "log", "symlog", "logit", ...} or ScaleBase
yticklabels unknown
yticks unknown
zorder float
get_agg_filter()

Return filter function to be used for agg filter.

get_alpha()

Return the alpha value used for blending - not supported on all backends.

get_animated()

Return whether the artist is animated.

get_axes()[source]

Return a list of Axes in the SubFigure. You can access and modify the Axes in the Figure through this list.

Do not modify the list itself. Instead, use add_axes, add_subplot or delaxes to add or remove an Axes.

Note: This is equivalent to the property axes.

get_children()

Get a list of artists contained in the figure.

get_clip_box()

Return the clipbox.

get_clip_on()

Return whether the artist uses clipping.

get_clip_path()

Return the clip path.

get_constrained_layout()[source]

Return whether constrained layout is being used.

See Constrained Layout Guide.

get_constrained_layout_pads(relative=False)[source]

Get padding for constrained_layout.

Returns a list of w_pad, h_pad in inches and wspace and hspace as fractions of the subplot.

See Constrained Layout Guide.

Parameters:
relativebool

If True, then convert from inches to figure relative.

get_contains()

[Deprecated] Return the custom contains function of the artist if set, or None.

See also

set_contains

Notes

Deprecated since version 3.3.

get_cursor_data(event)

Return the cursor data for a given event.

Note

This method is intended to be overridden by artist subclasses. As an end-user of Matplotlib you will most likely not call this method yourself.

Cursor data can be used by Artists to provide additional context information for a given event. The default implementation just returns None.

Subclasses can override the method and return arbitrary data. However, when doing so, they must ensure that format_cursor_data can convert the data to a string representation.

The only current use case is displaying the z-value of an AxesImage in the status bar of a plot window, while moving the mouse.

Parameters:
eventmatplotlib.backend_bases.MouseEvent
get_default_bbox_extra_artists()
get_edgecolor()

Get the edge color of the Figure rectangle.

get_facecolor()

Get the face color of the Figure rectangle.

get_figure()

Return the Figure instance the artist belongs to.

get_frameon()

Return the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.get_visible().

get_gid()

Return the group id.

get_in_layout()

Return boolean flag, True if artist is included in layout calculations.

E.g. Constrained Layout Guide, Figure.tight_layout(), and fig.savefig(fname, bbox_inches='tight').

get_label()

Return the label used for this artist in the legend.

get_linewidth()

Get the line width of the Figure rectangle.

get_path_effects()
get_picker()

Return the picking behavior of the artist.

The possible values are described in set_picker.

See also

set_picker, pickable, pick
get_rasterized()

Return whether the artist is to be rasterized.

get_sketch_params()

Return the sketch parameters for the artist.

Returns:
tuple or None

A 3-tuple with the following elements:

  • scale: The amplitude of the wiggle perpendicular to the source line.
  • length: The length of the wiggle along the line.
  • randomness: The scale factor by which the length is shrunken or expanded.

Returns None if no sketch parameters were set.

get_snap()

Return the snap setting.

See set_snap for details.

get_tightbbox(renderer, bbox_extra_artists=None)

Return a (tight) bounding box of the figure in inches.

Artists that have artist.set_in_layout(False) are not included in the bbox.

Parameters:
rendererRendererBase subclass

renderer that will be used to draw the figures (i.e. fig.canvas.get_renderer())

bbox_extra_artistslist of Artist or None

List of artists to include in the tight bounding box. If None (default), then all artist children of each Axes are included in the tight bounding box.

Returns:
BboxBase

containing the bounding box (in figure inches).

get_transform()

Return the Transform instance used by this artist.

get_transformed_clip_path_and_affine()

Return the clip path with the non-affine part of its transformation applied, and the remaining affine part of its transformation.

get_url()

Return the url.

get_visible()

Return the visibility.

get_window_extent(*args, **kwargs)

Return the figure bounding box in display space. Arguments are ignored.

get_zorder()

Return the artist's zorder.

have_units()

Return whether units are set on any axis.

init_layoutgrid()[source]

Initialize the layoutgrid for use in constrained_layout.

is_transform_set()

Return whether the Artist has an explicitly set transform.

This is True after set_transform has been called.

legend(*args, **kwargs)

Place a legend on the figure.

Call signatures:

legend()
legend(labels)
legend(handles, labels)

The call signatures correspond to these three different ways to use this method:

1. Automatic detection of elements to be shown in the legend

The elements to be added to the legend are automatically determined, when you do not pass in any extra arguments.

In this case, the labels are taken from the artist. You can specify them either at artist creation or by calling the set_label() method on the artist:

ax.plot([1, 2, 3], label='Inline label')
fig.legend()

or:

line, = ax.plot([1, 2, 3])
line.set_label('Label via method')
fig.legend()

Specific lines can be excluded from the automatic legend element selection by defining a label starting with an underscore. This is default for all artists, so calling Figure.legend without any arguments and without setting the labels manually will result in no legend being drawn.

2. Labeling existing plot elements

To make a legend for all artists on all Axes, call this function with an iterable of strings, one for each legend item. For example:

fig, (ax1, ax2)  = plt.subplots(1, 2)
ax1.plot([1, 3, 5], color='blue')
ax2.plot([2, 4, 6], color='red')
fig.legend(['the blues', 'the reds'])

Note: This call signature is discouraged, because the relation between plot elements and labels is only implicit by their order and can easily be mixed up.

3. Explicitly defining the elements in the legend

For full control of which artists have a legend entry, it is possible to pass an iterable of legend artists followed by an iterable of legend labels respectively:

fig.legend([line1, line2, line3], ['label1', 'label2', 'label3'])
Parameters:
handleslist of Artist, optional

A list of Artists (lines, patches) to be added to the legend. Use this together with labels, if you need full control on what is shown in the legend and the automatic mechanism described above is not sufficient.

The length of handles and labels should be the same in this case. If they are not, they are truncated to the smaller length.

labelslist of str, optional

A list of labels to show next to the artists. Use this together with handles, if you need full control on what is shown in the legend and the automatic mechanism described above is not sufficient.

Returns:
Legend
Other Parameters:
locstr or pair of floats, default: rcParams["legend.loc"] (default: 'best') ('best' for axes, 'upper right' for figures)

The location of the legend.

The strings 'upper left', 'upper right', 'lower left', 'lower right' place the legend at the corresponding corner of the axes/figure.

The strings 'upper center', 'lower center', 'center left', 'center right' place the legend at the center of the corresponding edge of the axes/figure.

The string 'center' places the legend at the center of the axes/figure.

The string 'best' places the legend at the location, among the nine locations defined so far, with the minimum overlap with other drawn artists. This option can be quite slow for plots with large amounts of data; your plotting speed may benefit from providing a specific location.

The location can also be a 2-tuple giving the coordinates of the lower-left corner of the legend in axes coordinates (in which case bbox_to_anchor will be ignored).

For back-compatibility, 'center right' (but no other location) can also be spelled 'right', and each "string" locations can also be given as a numeric value:

Location String Location Code
'best' 0
'upper right' 1
'upper left' 2
'lower left' 3
'lower right' 4
'right' 5
'center left' 6
'center right' 7
'lower center' 8
'upper center' 9
'center' 10
bbox_to_anchorBboxBase, 2-tuple, or 4-tuple of floats

Box that is used to position the legend in conjunction with loc. Defaults to axes.bbox (if called as a method to Axes.legend) or figure.bbox (if Figure.legend). This argument allows arbitrary placement of the legend.

Bbox coordinates are interpreted in the coordinate system given by bbox_transform, with the default transform Axes or Figure coordinates, depending on which legend is called.

If a 4-tuple or BboxBase is given, then it specifies the bbox (x, y, width, height) that the legend is placed in. To put the legend in the best location in the bottom right quadrant of the axes (or figure):

loc='best', bbox_to_anchor=(0.5, 0., 0.5, 0.5)

A 2-tuple (x, y) places the corner of the legend specified by loc at x, y. For example, to put the legend's upper right-hand corner in the center of the axes (or figure) the following keywords can be used:

loc='upper right', bbox_to_anchor=(0.5, 0.5)
ncolint, default: 1

The number of columns that the legend has.

propNone or matplotlib.font_manager.FontProperties or dict

The font properties of the legend. If None (default), the current matplotlib.rcParams will be used.

fontsizeint or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}

The font size of the legend. If the value is numeric the size will be the absolute font size in points. String values are relative to the current default font size. This argument is only used if prop is not specified.

labelcolorstr or list

The color of the text in the legend. Either a valid color string (for example, 'red'), or a list of color strings. The labelcolor can also be made to match the color of the line or marker using 'linecolor', 'markerfacecolor' (or 'mfc'), or 'markeredgecolor' (or 'mec').

numpointsint, default: rcParams["legend.numpoints"] (default: 1)

The number of marker points in the legend when creating a legend entry for a Line2D (line).

scatterpointsint, default: rcParams["legend.scatterpoints"] (default: 1)

The number of marker points in the legend when creating a legend entry for a PathCollection (scatter plot).

scatteryoffsetsiterable of floats, default: [0.375, 0.5, 0.3125]

The vertical offset (relative to the font size) for the markers created for a scatter plot legend entry. 0.0 is at the base the legend text, and 1.0 is at the top. To draw all markers at the same height, set to [0.5].

markerscalefloat, default: rcParams["legend.markerscale"] (default: 1.0)

The relative size of legend markers compared with the originally drawn ones.

markerfirstbool, default: True

If True, legend marker is placed to the left of the legend label. If False, legend marker is placed to the right of the legend label.

frameonbool, default: rcParams["legend.frameon"] (default: True)

Whether the legend should be drawn on a patch (frame).

fancyboxbool, default: rcParams["legend.fancybox"] (default: True)

Whether round edges should be enabled around the FancyBboxPatch which makes up the legend's background.

shadowbool, default: rcParams["legend.shadow"] (default: False)

Whether to draw a shadow behind the legend.

framealphafloat, default: rcParams["legend.framealpha"] (default: 0.8)

The alpha transparency of the legend's background. If shadow is activated and framealpha is None, the default value is ignored.

facecolor"inherit" or color, default: rcParams["legend.facecolor"] (default: 'inherit')

The legend's background color. If "inherit", use rcParams["axes.facecolor"] (default: 'white').

edgecolor"inherit" or color, default: rcParams["legend.edgecolor"] (default: '0.8')

The legend's background patch edge color. If "inherit", use take rcParams["axes.edgecolor"] (default: 'black').

mode{"expand", None}

If mode is set to "expand" the legend will be horizontally expanded to fill the axes area (or bbox_to_anchor if defines the legend's size).

bbox_transformNone or matplotlib.transforms.Transform

The transform for the bounding box (bbox_to_anchor). For a value of None (default) the Axes' transAxes transform will be used.

titlestr or None

The legend's title. Default is no title (None).

title_fontsizeint or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}, default: rcParams["legend.title_fontsize"] (default: None)

The font size of the legend's title.

borderpadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.borderpad"] (default: 0.4)

The fractional whitespace inside the legend border, in font-size units.

labelspacingfloat, default: rcParams["legend.labelspacing"] (default: 0.5)

The vertical space between the legend entries, in font-size units.

handlelengthfloat, default: rcParams["legend.handlelength"] (default: 2.0)

The length of the legend handles, in font-size units.

handletextpadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.handletextpad"] (default: 0.8)

The pad between the legend handle and text, in font-size units.

borderaxespadfloat, default: rcParams["legend.borderaxespad"] (default: 0.5)

The pad between the axes and legend border, in font-size units.

columnspacingfloat, default: rcParams["legend.columnspacing"] (default: 2.0)

The spacing between columns, in font-size units.

handler_mapdict or None

The custom dictionary mapping instances or types to a legend handler. This handler_map updates the default handler map found at matplotlib.legend.Legend.get_legend_handler_map.

See also

Axes.legend

Notes

Some artists are not supported by this function. See Legend guide for details.

property mouseover

If this property is set to True, the artist will be queried for custom context information when the mouse cursor moves over it.

See also get_cursor_data(), ToolCursorPosition and NavigationToolbar2.

pchanged()

Call all of the registered callbacks.

This function is triggered internally when a property is changed.

pick(mouseevent)

Process a pick event.

Each child artist will fire a pick event if mouseevent is over the artist and the artist has picker set.

pickable()

Return whether the artist is pickable.

properties()

Return a dictionary of all the properties of the artist.

remove()

Remove the artist from the figure if possible.

The effect will not be visible until the figure is redrawn, e.g., with FigureCanvasBase.draw_idle. Call relim to update the axes limits if desired.

Note: relim will not see collections even if the collection was added to the axes with autolim = True.

Note: there is no support for removing the artist's legend entry.

remove_callback(oid)

Remove a callback based on its observer id.

See also

add_callback
sca(a)

Set the current Axes to be a and return a.

set(**kwargs)

A property batch setter. Pass kwargs to set properties.

set_agg_filter(filter_func)

Set the agg filter.

Parameters:
filter_funccallable

A filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array.

set_alpha(alpha)

Set the alpha value used for blending - not supported on all backends.

Parameters:
alphascalar or None

alpha must be within the 0-1 range, inclusive.

set_animated(b)

Set whether the artist is intended to be used in an animation.

If True, the artist is excluded from regular drawing of the figure. You have to call Figure.draw_artist / Axes.draw_artist explicitly on the artist. This appoach is used to speed up animations using blitting.

See also matplotlib.animation and Faster rendering by using blitting.

Parameters:
bbool
set_clip_box(clipbox)

Set the artist's clip Bbox.

Parameters:
clipboxBbox
set_clip_on(b)

Set whether the artist uses clipping.

When False artists will be visible outside of the axes which can lead to unexpected results.

Parameters:
bbool
set_clip_path(path, transform=None)

Set the artist's clip path.

Parameters:
pathPatch or Path or TransformedPath or None

The clip path. If given a Path, transform must be provided as well. If None, a previously set clip path is removed.

transformTransform, optional

Only used if path is a Path, in which case the given Path is converted to a TransformedPath using transform.

Notes

For efficiency, if path is a Rectangle this method will set the clipping box to the corresponding rectangle and set the clipping path to None.

For technical reasons (support of set), a tuple (path, transform) is also accepted as a single positional parameter.

set_contains(picker)

[Deprecated] Define a custom contains test for the artist.

The provided callable replaces the default contains method of the artist.

Parameters:
pickercallable

A custom picker function to evaluate if an event is within the artist. The function must have the signature:

def contains(artist: Artist, event: MouseEvent) -> bool, dict

that returns:

  • a bool indicating if the event is within the artist
  • a dict of additional information. The dict should at least return the same information as the default contains() implementation of the respective artist, but may provide additional information.

Notes

Deprecated since version 3.3.

set_edgecolor(color)

Set the edge color of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
colorcolor
set_facecolor(color)

Set the face color of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
colorcolor
set_figure(fig)

Set the Figure instance the artist belongs to.

Parameters:
figFigure
set_frameon(b)

Set the figure's background patch visibility, i.e. whether the figure background will be drawn. Equivalent to Figure.patch.set_visible().

Parameters:
bbool
set_gid(gid)

Set the (group) id for the artist.

Parameters:
gidstr
set_in_layout(in_layout)

Set if artist is to be included in layout calculations, E.g. Constrained Layout Guide, Figure.tight_layout(), and fig.savefig(fname, bbox_inches='tight').

Parameters:
in_layoutbool
set_label(s)

Set a label that will be displayed in the legend.

Parameters:
sobject

s will be converted to a string by calling str.

set_linewidth(linewidth)

Set the line width of the Figure rectangle.

Parameters:
linewidthnumber
set_path_effects(path_effects)

Set the path effects.

Parameters:
path_effectsAbstractPathEffect
set_picker(picker)

Define the picking behavior of the artist.

Parameters:
pickerNone or bool or float or callable

This can be one of the following:

  • None: Picking is disabled for this artist (default).

  • A boolean: If True then picking will be enabled and the artist will fire a pick event if the mouse event is over the artist.

  • A float: If picker is a number it is interpreted as an epsilon tolerance in points and the artist will fire off an event if its data is within epsilon of the mouse event. For some artists like lines and patch collections, the artist may provide additional data to the pick event that is generated, e.g., the indices of the data within epsilon of the pick event

  • A function: If picker is callable, it is a user supplied function which determines whether the artist is hit by the mouse event:

    hit, props = picker(artist, mouseevent)
    

    to determine the hit test. if the mouse event is over the artist, return hit=True and props is a dictionary of properties you want added to the PickEvent attributes.

set_rasterized(rasterized)

Force rasterized (bitmap) drawing for vector graphics output.

Rasterized drawing is not supported by all artists. If you try to enable this on an artist that does not support it, the command has no effect and a warning will be issued.

This setting is ignored for pixel-based output.

See also Rasterization for vector graphics.

Parameters:
rasterizedbool
set_sketch_params(scale=None, length=None, randomness=None)

Set the sketch parameters.

Parameters:
scalefloat, optional

The amplitude of the wiggle perpendicular to the source line, in pixels. If scale is None, or not provided, no sketch filter will be provided.

lengthfloat, optional

The length of the wiggle along the line, in pixels (default 128.0)

randomnessfloat, optional

The scale factor by which the length is shrunken or expanded (default 16.0)

set_snap(snap)

Set the snapping behavior.

Snapping aligns positions with the pixel grid, which results in clearer images. For example, if a black line of 1px width was defined at a position in between two pixels, the resulting image would contain the interpolated value of that line in the pixel grid, which would be a grey value on both adjacent pixel positions. In contrast, snapping will move the line to the nearest integer pixel value, so that the resulting image will really contain a 1px wide black line.

Snapping is currently only supported by the Agg and MacOSX backends.

Parameters:
snapbool or None

Possible values:

  • True: Snap vertices to the nearest pixel center.
  • False: Do not modify vertex positions.
  • None: (auto) If the path contains only rectilinear line segments, round to the nearest pixel center.
set_transform(t)

Set the artist transform.

Parameters:
tTransform
set_url(url)

Set the url for the artist.

Parameters:
urlstr
set_visible(b)

Set the artist's visibility.

Parameters:
bbool
set_zorder(level)

Set the zorder for the artist. Artists with lower zorder values are drawn first.

Parameters:
levelfloat
property stale

Whether the artist is 'stale' and needs to be re-drawn for the output to match the internal state of the artist.

property sticky_edges

x and y sticky edge lists for autoscaling.

When performing autoscaling, if a data limit coincides with a value in the corresponding sticky_edges list, then no margin will be added--the view limit "sticks" to the edge. A typical use case is histograms, where one usually expects no margin on the bottom edge (0) of the histogram.

This attribute cannot be assigned to; however, the x and y lists can be modified in place as needed.

Examples

>>> artist.sticky_edges.x[:] = (xmin, xmax)
>>> artist.sticky_edges.y[:] = (ymin, ymax)
subfigures(nrows=1, ncols=1, squeeze=True, wspace=None, hspace=None, width_ratios=None, height_ratios=None, **kwargs)

Add a subfigure to this figure or subfigure.

A subfigure has the same artist methods as a figure, and is logically the same as a figure, but cannot print itself. See Figure subfigures.

Parameters:
nrows, ncolsint, default: 1

Number of rows/columns of the subfigure grid.

squeezebool, default: True

If True, extra dimensions are squeezed out from the returned array of subfigures.

wspace, hspacefloat, default: None

The amount of width/height reserved for space between subfigures, expressed as a fraction of the average subfigure width/height. If not given, the values will be inferred from a figure or rcParams when necessary.

width_ratiosarray-like of length ncols, optional

Defines the relative widths of the columns. Each column gets a relative width of width_ratios[i] / sum(width_ratios). If not given, all columns will have the same width.

height_ratiosarray-like of length nrows, optional

Defines the relative heights of the rows. Each row gets a relative height of height_ratios[i] / sum(height_ratios). If not given, all rows will have the same height.

subplot_mosaic(mosaic, *, subplot_kw=None, gridspec_kw=None, empty_sentinel='.')

Build a layout of Axes based on ASCII art or nested lists.

This is a helper function to build complex GridSpec layouts visually.

Note

This API is provisional and may be revised in the future based on early user feedback.

Parameters:
mosaiclist of list of {hashable or nested} or str

A visual layout of how you want your Axes to be arranged labeled as strings. For example

x = [['A panel', 'A panel', 'edge'],
     ['C panel', '.',       'edge']]

Produces 4 Axes:

  • 'A panel' which is 1 row high and spans the first two columns
  • 'edge' which is 2 rows high and is on the right edge
  • 'C panel' which in 1 row and 1 column wide in the bottom left
  • a blank space 1 row and 1 column wide in the bottom center

Any of the entries in the layout can be a list of lists of the same form to create nested layouts.

If input is a str, then it can either be a multi-line string of the form

'''
AAE
C.E
'''

where each character is a column and each line is a row. Or it can be a single-line string where rows are separated by ;:

'AB;CC'

The string notation allows only single character Axes labels and does not support nesting but is very terse.

subplot_kwdict, optional

Dictionary with keywords passed to the Figure.add_subplot call used to create each subplot.

gridspec_kwdict, optional

Dictionary with keywords passed to the GridSpec constructor used to create the grid the subplots are placed on.

empty_sentinelobject, optional

Entry in the layout to mean "leave this space empty". Defaults to '.'. Note, if layout is a string, it is processed via inspect.cleandoc to remove leading white space, which may interfere with using white-space as the empty sentinel.

Returns:
dict[label, Axes]

A dictionary mapping the labels to the Axes objects. The order of the axes is left-to-right and top-to-bottom of their position in the total layout.

subplots(nrows=1, ncols=1, *, sharex=False, sharey=False, squeeze=True, subplot_kw=None, gridspec_kw=None)

Add a set of subplots to this figure.

This utility wrapper makes it convenient to create common layouts of subplots in a single call.

Parameters:
nrows, ncolsint, default: 1

Number of rows/columns of the subplot grid.

sharex, shareybool or {'none', 'all', 'row', 'col'}, default: False

Controls sharing of properties among x (sharex) or y (sharey) axes:

  • True or 'all': x- or y-axis will be shared among all subplots.
  • False or 'none': each subplot x- or y-axis will be independent.
  • 'row': each subplot row will share an x- or y-axis.
  • 'col': each subplot column will share an x- or y-axis.

When subplots have a shared x-axis along a column, only the x tick labels of the bottom subplot are created. Similarly, when subplots have a shared y-axis along a row, only the y tick labels of the first column subplot are created. To later turn other subplots' ticklabels on, use tick_params.

When subplots have a shared axis that has units, calling Axis.set_units will update each axis with the new units.

squeezebool, default: True
  • If True, extra dimensions are squeezed out from the returned array of Axes:
    • if only one subplot is constructed (nrows=ncols=1), the resulting single Axes object is returned as a scalar.
    • for Nx1 or 1xM subplots, the returned object is a 1D numpy object array of Axes objects.
    • for NxM, subplots with N>1 and M>1 are returned as a 2D array.
  • If False, no squeezing at all is done: the returned Axes object is always a 2D array containing Axes instances, even if it ends up being 1x1.
subplot_kwdict, optional

Dict with keywords passed to the Figure.add_subplot call used to create each subplot.

gridspec_kwdict, optional

Dict with keywords passed to the GridSpec constructor used to create the grid the subplots are placed on.

Returns:
Axes or array of Axes

Either a single Axes object or an array of Axes objects if more than one subplot was created. The dimensions of the resulting array can be controlled with the squeeze keyword, see above.

Examples

# First create some toy data:
x = np.linspace(0, 2*np.pi, 400)
y = np.sin(x**2)

# Create a figure
plt.figure()

# Create a subplot
ax = fig.subplots()
ax.plot(x, y)
ax.set_title('Simple plot')

# Create two subplots and unpack the output array immediately
ax1, ax2 = fig.subplots(1, 2, sharey=True)
ax1.plot(x, y)
ax1.set_title('Sharing Y axis')
ax2.scatter(x, y)

# Create four polar Axes and access them through the returned array
axes = fig.subplots(2, 2, subplot_kw=dict(projection='polar'))
axes[0, 0].plot(x, y)
axes[1, 1].scatter(x, y)

# Share a X axis with each column of subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex='col')

# Share a Y axis with each row of subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharey='row')

# Share both X and Y axes with all subplots
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex='all', sharey='all')

# Note that this is the same as
fig.subplots(2, 2, sharex=True, sharey=True)
subplots_adjust(left=None, bottom=None, right=None, top=None, wspace=None, hspace=None)

Adjust the subplot layout parameters.

Unset parameters are left unmodified; initial values are given by rcParams["figure.subplot.[name]"].

Parameters:
leftfloat, optional

The position of the left edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

rightfloat, optional

The position of the right edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

bottomfloat, optional

The position of the bottom edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

topfloat, optional

The position of the top edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

wspacefloat, optional

The width of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes width.

hspacefloat, optional

The height of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes height.

suptitle(t, **kwargs)

Add a centered suptitle to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The suptitle text.

xfloat, default: 0.5

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.98

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: center

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: top

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the suptitle.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

supxlabel(t, **kwargs)

Add a centered supxlabel to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The supxlabel text.

xfloat, default: 0.5

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.01

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: center

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: bottom

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the supxlabel.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

supylabel(t, **kwargs)

Add a centered supylabel to the figure.

Parameters:
tstr

The supylabel text.

xfloat, default: 0.02

The x location of the text in figure coordinates.

yfloat, default: 0.5

The y location of the text in figure coordinates.

horizontalalignment, ha{'center', 'left', 'right'}, default: left

The horizontal alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

verticalalignment, va{'top', 'center', 'bottom', 'baseline'}, default: center

The vertical alignment of the text relative to (x, y).

fontsize, sizedefault: rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large')

The font size of the text. See Text.set_size for possible values.

fontweight, weightdefault: rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal')

The font weight of the text. See Text.set_weight for possible values.

Returns:
text

The Text instance of the supylabel.

Other Parameters:
fontpropertiesNone or dict, optional

A dict of font properties. If fontproperties is given the default values for font size and weight are taken from the FontProperties defaults. rcParams["figure.titlesize"] (default: 'large') and rcParams["figure.titleweight"] (default: 'normal') are ignored in this case.

**kwargs

Additional kwargs are matplotlib.text.Text properties.

text(x, y, s, fontdict=None, **kwargs)

Add text to figure.

Parameters:
x, yfloat

The position to place the text. By default, this is in figure coordinates, floats in [0, 1]. The coordinate system can be changed using the transform keyword.

sstr

The text string.

fontdictdict, optional

A dictionary to override the default text properties. If not given, the defaults are determined by rcParams["font.*"]. Properties passed as kwargs override the corresponding ones given in fontdict.

Returns:
Text
Other Parameters:
**kwargsText properties

Other miscellaneous text parameters.

Property Description
agg_filter a filter function, which takes a (m, n, 3) float array and a dpi value, and returns a (m, n, 3) array
alpha scalar or None
animated bool
backgroundcolor color
bbox dict with properties for patches.FancyBboxPatch
clip_box Bbox
clip_on bool
clip_path Patch or (Path, Transform) or None
color or c color
contains unknown
figure Figure
fontfamily or family {FONTNAME, 'serif', 'sans-serif', 'cursive', 'fantasy', 'monospace'}
fontproperties or font or font_properties font_manager.FontProperties or str or pathlib.Path
fontsize or size float or {'xx-small', 'x-small', 'small', 'medium', 'large', 'x-large', 'xx-large'}
fontstretch or stretch {a numeric value in range 0-1000, 'ultra-condensed', 'extra-condensed', 'condensed', 'semi-condensed', 'normal', 'semi-expanded', 'expanded', 'extra-expanded', 'ultra-expanded'}
fontstyle or style {'normal', 'italic', 'oblique'}
fontvariant or variant {'normal', 'small-caps'}
fontweight or weight {a numeric value in range 0-1000, 'ultralight', 'light', 'normal', 'regular', 'book', 'medium', 'roman', 'semibold', 'demibold', 'demi', 'bold', 'heavy', 'extra bold', 'black'}
gid str
horizontalalignment or ha {'center', 'right', 'left'}
in_layout bool
label object
linespacing float (multiple of font size)
math_fontfamily str
multialignment or ma {'left', 'right', 'center'}
path_effects AbstractPathEffect
picker None or bool or float or callable
position (float, float)
rasterized bool
rotation float or {'vertical', 'horizontal'}
rotation_mode {None, 'default', 'anchor'}
sketch_params (scale: float, length: float, randomness: float)
snap bool or None
text object
transform Transform
transform_rotates_text bool
url str
usetex bool or None
verticalalignment or va {'center', 'top', 'bottom', 'baseline', 'center_baseline'}
visible bool
wrap bool
x float
y float
zorder float
update(props)

Update this artist's properties from the dict props.

Parameters:
propsdict
update_from(other)

Copy properties from other to self.

zorder = 0
class matplotlib.figure.SubplotParams(left=None, bottom=None, right=None, top=None, wspace=None, hspace=None)[source]

A class to hold the parameters for a subplot.

Defaults are given by rcParams["figure.subplot.[name]"].

Parameters:
leftfloat

The position of the left edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

rightfloat

The position of the right edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure width.

bottomfloat

The position of the bottom edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

topfloat

The position of the top edge of the subplots, as a fraction of the figure height.

wspacefloat

The width of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes width.

hspacefloat

The height of the padding between subplots, as a fraction of the average Axes height.

update(left=None, bottom=None, right=None, top=None, wspace=None, hspace=None)[source]

Update the dimensions of the passed parameters. None means unchanged.

matplotlib.figure.figaspect(arg)[source]

Calculate the width and height for a figure with a specified aspect ratio.

While the height is taken from rcParams["figure.figsize"] (default: [6.4, 4.8]), the width is adjusted to match the desired aspect ratio. Additionally, it is ensured that the width is in the range [4., 16.] and the height is in the range [2., 16.]. If necessary, the default height is adjusted to ensure this.

Parameters:
argfloat or 2D array

If a float, this defines the aspect ratio (i.e. the ratio height / width). In case of an array the aspect ratio is number of rows / number of columns, so that the array could be fitted in the figure undistorted.

Returns:
width, heightfloat

The figure size in inches.

Notes

If you want to create an Axes within the figure, that still preserves the aspect ratio, be sure to create it with equal width and height. See examples below.

Thanks to Fernando Perez for this function.

Examples

Make a figure twice as tall as it is wide:

w, h = figaspect(2.)
fig = Figure(figsize=(w, h))
ax = fig.add_axes([0.1, 0.1, 0.8, 0.8])
ax.imshow(A, **kwargs)

Make a figure with the proper aspect for an array:

A = rand(5, 3)
w, h = figaspect(A)
fig = Figure(figsize=(w, h))
ax = fig.add_axes([0.1, 0.1, 0.8, 0.8])
ax.imshow(A, **kwargs)