Version 3.1.2
matplotlib

Resizing axes with tight layout

tight_layout attempts to resize subplots in a figure so that there are no overlaps between axes objects and labels on the axes.

See Tight Layout guide for more details and Constrained Layout Guide for an alternative.

===============================
Resizing axes with tight layout
===============================

`~.figure.Figure.tight_layout` attempts to resize subplots in
a figure so that there are no overlaps between axes objects and labels
on the axes.

See :doc:`/tutorials/intermediate/tight_layout_guide` for more details and
:doc:`/tutorials/intermediate/constrainedlayout_guide` for an alternative.

"""

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import itertools
import warnings


fontsizes = itertools.cycle([8, 16, 24, 32])


def example_plot(ax):
    ax.plot([1, 2])
    ax.set_xlabel('x-label', fontsize=next(fontsizes))
    ax.set_ylabel('y-label', fontsize=next(fontsizes))
    ax.set_title('Title', fontsize=next(fontsizes))
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/build/matplotlib-mO9dyQ/matplotlib-3.1.2/examples/subplots_axes_and_figures/demo_tight_layout.py", line 1
    ===============================
    ^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax
fig, ax = plt.subplots()
example_plot(ax)
plt.tight_layout()
fig, ((ax1, ax2), (ax3, ax4)) = plt.subplots(nrows=2, ncols=2)
example_plot(ax1)
example_plot(ax2)
example_plot(ax3)
example_plot(ax4)
plt.tight_layout()
fig, (ax1, ax2) = plt.subplots(nrows=2, ncols=1)
example_plot(ax1)
example_plot(ax2)
plt.tight_layout()
fig, (ax1, ax2) = plt.subplots(nrows=1, ncols=2)
example_plot(ax1)
example_plot(ax2)
plt.tight_layout()
fig, axes = plt.subplots(nrows=3, ncols=3)
for row in axes:
    for ax in row:
        example_plot(ax)
plt.tight_layout()
fig = plt.figure()

ax1 = plt.subplot(221)
ax2 = plt.subplot(223)
ax3 = plt.subplot(122)

example_plot(ax1)
example_plot(ax2)
example_plot(ax3)

plt.tight_layout()
fig = plt.figure()

ax1 = plt.subplot2grid((3, 3), (0, 0))
ax2 = plt.subplot2grid((3, 3), (0, 1), colspan=2)
ax3 = plt.subplot2grid((3, 3), (1, 0), colspan=2, rowspan=2)
ax4 = plt.subplot2grid((3, 3), (1, 2), rowspan=2)

example_plot(ax1)
example_plot(ax2)
example_plot(ax3)
example_plot(ax4)

plt.tight_layout()

plt.show()
fig = plt.figure()

gs1 = fig.add_gridspec(3, 1)
ax1 = fig.add_subplot(gs1[0])
ax2 = fig.add_subplot(gs1[1])
ax3 = fig.add_subplot(gs1[2])

example_plot(ax1)
example_plot(ax2)
example_plot(ax3)

gs1.tight_layout(fig, rect=[None, None, 0.45, None])

gs2 = fig.add_gridspec(2, 1)
ax4 = fig.add_subplot(gs2[0])
ax5 = fig.add_subplot(gs2[1])

example_plot(ax4)
example_plot(ax5)

with warnings.catch_warnings():
    # gs2.tight_layout cannot handle the subplots from the first gridspec
    # (gs1), so it will raise a warning. We are going to match the gridspecs
    # manually so we can filter the warning away.
    warnings.simplefilter("ignore", UserWarning)
    gs2.tight_layout(fig, rect=[0.45, None, None, None])

# now match the top and bottom of two gridspecs.
top = min(gs1.top, gs2.top)
bottom = max(gs1.bottom, gs2.bottom)

gs1.update(top=top, bottom=bottom)
gs2.update(top=top, bottom=bottom)

plt.show()

References

The use of the following functions and methods is shown in this example:

import matplotlib
matplotlib.pyplot.tight_layout
matplotlib.figure.Figure.tight_layout
matplotlib.figure.Figure.add_gridspec
matplotlib.figure.Figure.add_subplot
matplotlib.pyplot.subplot2grid

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