How to change background color for scatter plot in matplotlib

Question

How do I change the background color of a scatter plot in matplotlib?

Currently I have

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
plt.scatter(X, Y, c=T, marker='o', s=(0.005*r), linewidth=0, cmap=cm.coolwarm)
plt.scatter(X_stars, Y_stars, marker='o', s=(0.00000005*r), color='white')

plt.savefig(filename, format='ps')

I want the background to be black, not white. I already changed facecolor and edgecolor to black, but without the desired effect. Setting transparent=True made it transparent so that I could change the background in Photoshop, but it must work in matplotlib as I have a very large number of plots.

If you want to use the state-machine interface, you can add plt.gca().set_axis_bgcolor('black') after the calls to plt.scatter — sodd
– sodd, Commented Aug 2, 2013 at 9:28

bserra · Accepted Answer · 2019-02-11 14:12:51Z

11

EDIT: As mentionned by endolith in the comments axisbg was deprecated in version 2.0 of matplotlib. Use facecolor instead.

ax = fig.add_subplot(111, facecolor='black')

You could use the axisbg argument of the add_subplot method. Here's a little example:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

a = random(100)*10
b = range(100)
fig = plt.figure(1)
ax = fig.add_subplot(111, axisbg='black')
ax.scatter(a,b)
fig.canvas.draw()

edited Feb 11, 2019 at 14:12

answered Aug 1, 2013 at 9:46

bserra

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1 Comment

endolith Over a year ago

It's now called facecolor

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