Radar chart (aka spider or star chart)#

This example creates a radar chart, also known as a spider or star chart [1].

Although this example allows a frame of either 'circle' or 'polygon', polygon frames don't have proper gridlines (the lines are circles instead of polygons). It's possible to get a polygon grid by setting GRIDLINE_INTERPOLATION_STEPS in matplotlib.axis to the desired number of vertices, but the orientation of the polygon is not aligned with the radial axes.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np

from matplotlib.patches import Circle, RegularPolygon
from matplotlib.path import Path
from matplotlib.projections import register_projection
from matplotlib.projections.polar import PolarAxes
from matplotlib.spines import Spine
from matplotlib.transforms import Affine2D


def radar_factory(num_vars, frame='circle'):
    """
    Create a radar chart with `num_vars` axes.

    This function creates a RadarAxes projection and registers it.

    Parameters
    ----------
    num_vars : int
        Number of variables for radar chart.
    frame : {'circle', 'polygon'}
        Shape of frame surrounding axes.

    """
    # calculate evenly-spaced axis angles
    theta = np.linspace(0, 2*np.pi, num_vars, endpoint=False)

    class RadarTransform(PolarAxes.PolarTransform):

        def transform_path_non_affine(self, path):
            # Paths with non-unit interpolation steps correspond to gridlines,
            # in which case we force interpolation (to defeat PolarTransform's
            # autoconversion to circular arcs).
            if path._interpolation_steps > 1:
                path = path.interpolated(num_vars)
            return Path(self.transform(path.vertices), path.codes)

    class RadarAxes(PolarAxes):

        name = 'radar'
        PolarTransform = RadarTransform

        def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
            super().__init__(*args, **kwargs)
            # rotate plot such that the first axis is at the top
            self.set_theta_zero_location('N')

        def fill(self, *args, closed=True, **kwargs):
            """Override fill so that line is closed by default"""
            return super().fill(closed=closed, *args, **kwargs)

        def plot(self, *args, **kwargs):
            """Override plot so that line is closed by default"""
            lines = super().plot(*args, **kwargs)
            for line in lines:
                self._close_line(line)

        def _close_line(self, line):
            x, y = line.get_data()
            # FIXME: markers at x[0], y[0] get doubled-up
            if x[0] != x[-1]:
                x = np.append(x, x[0])
                y = np.append(y, y[0])
                line.set_data(x, y)

        def set_varlabels(self, labels):
            self.set_thetagrids(np.degrees(theta), labels)

        def _gen_axes_patch(self):
            # The Axes patch must be centered at (0.5, 0.5) and of radius 0.5
            # in axes coordinates.
            if frame == 'circle':
                return Circle((0.5, 0.5), 0.5)
            elif frame == 'polygon':
                return RegularPolygon((0.5, 0.5), num_vars,
                                      radius=.5, edgecolor="k")
            else:
                raise ValueError("Unknown value for 'frame': %s" % frame)

        def _gen_axes_spines(self):
            if frame == 'circle':
                return super()._gen_axes_spines()
            elif frame == 'polygon':
                # spine_type must be 'left'/'right'/'top'/'bottom'/'circle'.
                spine = Spine(axes=self,
                              spine_type='circle',
                              path=Path.unit_regular_polygon(num_vars))
                # unit_regular_polygon gives a polygon of radius 1 centered at
                # (0, 0) but we want a polygon of radius 0.5 centered at (0.5,
                # 0.5) in axes coordinates.
                spine.set_transform(Affine2D().scale(.5).translate(.5, .5)
                                    + self.transAxes)
                return {'polar': spine}
            else:
                raise ValueError("Unknown value for 'frame': %s" % frame)

    register_projection(RadarAxes)
    return theta


def example_data():
    # The following data is from the Denver Aerosol Sources and Health study.
    # See doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2008.12.017
    #
    # The data are pollution source profile estimates for five modeled
    # pollution sources (e.g., cars, wood-burning, etc) that emit 7-9 chemical
    # species. The radar charts are experimented with here to see if we can
    # nicely visualize how the modeled source profiles change across four
    # scenarios:
    #  1) No gas-phase species present, just seven particulate counts on
    #     Sulfate
    #     Nitrate
    #     Elemental Carbon (EC)
    #     Organic Carbon fraction 1 (OC)
    #     Organic Carbon fraction 2 (OC2)
    #     Organic Carbon fraction 3 (OC3)
    #     Pyrolyzed Organic Carbon (OP)
    #  2)Inclusion of gas-phase specie carbon monoxide (CO)
    #  3)Inclusion of gas-phase specie ozone (O3).
    #  4)Inclusion of both gas-phase species is present...
    data = [
        ['Sulfate', 'Nitrate', 'EC', 'OC1', 'OC2', 'OC3', 'OP', 'CO', 'O3'],
        ('Basecase', [
            [0.88, 0.01, 0.03, 0.03, 0.00, 0.06, 0.01, 0.00, 0.00],
            [0.07, 0.95, 0.04, 0.05, 0.00, 0.02, 0.01, 0.00, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.02, 0.85, 0.19, 0.05, 0.10, 0.00, 0.00, 0.00],
            [0.02, 0.01, 0.07, 0.01, 0.21, 0.12, 0.98, 0.00, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.01, 0.02, 0.71, 0.74, 0.70, 0.00, 0.00, 0.00]]),
        ('With CO', [
            [0.88, 0.02, 0.02, 0.02, 0.00, 0.05, 0.00, 0.05, 0.00],
            [0.08, 0.94, 0.04, 0.02, 0.00, 0.01, 0.12, 0.04, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.01, 0.79, 0.10, 0.00, 0.05, 0.00, 0.31, 0.00],
            [0.00, 0.02, 0.03, 0.38, 0.31, 0.31, 0.00, 0.59, 0.00],
            [0.02, 0.02, 0.11, 0.47, 0.69, 0.58, 0.88, 0.00, 0.00]]),
        ('With O3', [
            [0.89, 0.01, 0.07, 0.00, 0.00, 0.05, 0.00, 0.00, 0.03],
            [0.07, 0.95, 0.05, 0.04, 0.00, 0.02, 0.12, 0.00, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.02, 0.86, 0.27, 0.16, 0.19, 0.00, 0.00, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.03, 0.00, 0.32, 0.29, 0.27, 0.00, 0.00, 0.95],
            [0.02, 0.00, 0.03, 0.37, 0.56, 0.47, 0.87, 0.00, 0.00]]),
        ('CO & O3', [
            [0.87, 0.01, 0.08, 0.00, 0.00, 0.04, 0.00, 0.00, 0.01],
            [0.09, 0.95, 0.02, 0.03, 0.00, 0.01, 0.13, 0.06, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.02, 0.71, 0.24, 0.13, 0.16, 0.00, 0.50, 0.00],
            [0.01, 0.03, 0.00, 0.28, 0.24, 0.23, 0.00, 0.44, 0.88],
            [0.02, 0.00, 0.18, 0.45, 0.64, 0.55, 0.86, 0.00, 0.16]])
    ]
    return data


if __name__ == '__main__':
    N = 9
    theta = radar_factory(N, frame='polygon')

    data = example_data()
    spoke_labels = data.pop(0)

    fig, axs = plt.subplots(figsize=(9, 9), nrows=2, ncols=2,
                            subplot_kw=dict(projection='radar'))
    fig.subplots_adjust(wspace=0.25, hspace=0.20, top=0.85, bottom=0.05)

    colors = ['b', 'r', 'g', 'm', 'y']
    # Plot the four cases from the example data on separate axes
    for ax, (title, case_data) in zip(axs.flat, data):
        ax.set_rgrids([0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8])
        ax.set_title(title, weight='bold', size='medium', position=(0.5, 1.1),
                     horizontalalignment='center', verticalalignment='center')
        for d, color in zip(case_data, colors):
            ax.plot(theta, d, color=color)
            ax.fill(theta, d, facecolor=color, alpha=0.25, label='_nolegend_')
        ax.set_varlabels(spoke_labels)

    # add legend relative to top-left plot
    labels = ('Factor 1', 'Factor 2', 'Factor 3', 'Factor 4', 'Factor 5')
    legend = axs[0, 0].legend(labels, loc=(0.9, .95),
                              labelspacing=0.1, fontsize='small')

    fig.text(0.5, 0.965, '5-Factor Solution Profiles Across Four Scenarios',
             horizontalalignment='center', color='black', weight='bold',
             size='large')

    plt.show()
Basecase, With CO, With O3, CO & O3

Total running time of the script: (0 minutes 1.591 seconds)

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