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ggplot2

Overview

ggplot2 is a system for declaratively creating graphics, based on The Grammar of Graphics. You provide the data, tell ggplot2 how to map variables to aesthetics, what graphical primitives to use, and it takes care of the details.

Installation

# The easiest way to get ggplot2 is to install the whole tidyverse:
install.packages("tidyverse")

# Alternatively, install just ggplot2:
install.packages("ggplot2")

# Or the the development version from GitHub:
# install.packages("devtools")
devtools::install_github("tidyverse/ggplot2")

Cheatsheet

Usage

It’s hard to succinctly describe how ggplot2 works because it embodies a deep philosophy of visualisation. However, in most cases you start with ggplot(), supply a dataset and aesthetic mapping (with aes()). You then add on layers (like geom_point() or geom_histogram()), scales (like scale_colour_brewer()), faceting specifications (like facet_wrap()) and coordinate systems (like coord_flip()).

library(ggplot2)

ggplot(mpg, aes(displ, hwy, colour = class)) + 
  geom_point()

Lifecycle

ggplot2 is now over 10 years old and is used by hundreds of thousands of people to make millions of plots. That means, by-and-large, ggplot2 itself changes relatively little. When we do make changes, they will be generally to add new functions or arguments rather than changing the behaviour of existing functions, and if we do make changes to existing behaviour we will do them for compelling reasons.

If you are looking for innovation, look to ggplot2’s rich ecosystem of extensions. See a community maintained list at http://www.ggplot2-exts.org/gallery/.

Learning ggplot2

If you are new to ggplot2 you are better off starting with a systematic introduction, rather than trying to learn from reading individual documentation pages. Currently, there are three good places to start:

  1. The data visualisation and graphics for communication chapters in R for data science. R for data science is designed to give you a comprehensive introduction to the tidyverse, and these two chapters will you get up to speed with the essentials of ggplot2 as quickly as possible.

  2. If you’d like to take an interactive online course, try Data visualisation with ggplot2 by Rick Scavetta on DataCamp.

  3. If you want to dive into making common graphics as quickly as possible, I recommend The R Graphics Cookbook by Winston Chang. It provides a set of recipes to solve common graphics problems. A 2nd edition is due out in 2018.

If you’ve mastered the basics and want to learn more, read ggplot2: Elegant Graphics for Data Analysis. It describes the theoretical underpinnings of ggplot2 and shows you how all the pieces fit together. This book helps you understand the theory that underpins ggplot2, and will help you create new types of graphics specifically tailored to your needs. The book is not available for free, but you can find the complete source for the book at https://github.com/hadley/ggplot2-book.

Getting help

There are two main places to get help with ggplot2:

  1. The RStudio community is a friendly place to ask any questions about ggplot2.

  2. Stack Overflow is a great source of answers to common ggplot2 questions. It is also a great place to get help, once you have created a reproducible example that illustrates your problem.

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Version

Install

install.packages('ggplot2')

Monthly Downloads

1,795,971

Version

3.1.1

License

GPL-2 | file LICENSE

Issues

Pull Requests

Stars

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Maintainer

Last Published

February 23rd, 2024

Functions in ggplot2 (3.1.1)

annotation_raster

Annotation: high-performance rectangular tiling
as.list.ggproto

Convert a ggproto object to a list
draw_key

Key drawing functions
economics

US economic time series
find_panel

Find panels in a gtable
fortify-multcomp

Fortify methods for objects produced by multcomp
geom_bin2d

Heatmap of 2d bin counts
geom_blank

Draw nothing
geom_smooth

Smoothed conditional means
aes_colour_fill_alpha

Colour related aesthetics: colour, fill and alpha
geom_spoke

Line segments parameterised by location, direction and distance
ggplotGrob

Generate a ggplot2 plot grob.
ggplot_add

Add custom objects to ggplot
aes_group_order

Aesthetics: grouping
aes_all

Given a character vector, create a set of identity mappings
as_labeller

Coerce to labeller function
autolayer

Create a ggplot layer appropriate to a particular data type
aes_auto

Automatic aesthetic mapping
coord_munch

Munch coordinates data
coord_polar

Polar coordinates
guide_colourbar

Continuous colour bar guide
diamonds

Prices of 50,000 round cut diamonds
autoplot

Create a complete ggplot appropriate to a particular data type
benchplot

Benchmark plot creation time. Broken down into construct, build, render and draw times.
discrete_scale

Discrete scale constructor.
geom_density_2d

Contours of a 2d density estimate
geom_dotplot

Dot plot
geom_errorbarh

Horizontal error bars
guide_legend

Legend guide
geom_hex

Hexagonal heatmap of 2d bin counts
geom_violin

Violin plot
+.gg

Add components to a plot
combine_vars

Take input data and define a mapping between faceting variables and ROW, COL and PANEL keys
gg_dep

Give a deprecation error, warning, or message, depending on version number.
continuous_scale

Continuous scale constructor.
coord_trans

Transformed Cartesian coordinate system
ggplot

Create a new ggplot
labs

Modify axis, legend, and plot labels
cut_interval

Discretise numeric data into categorical
facet_wrap

Wrap a 1d ribbon of panels into 2d
ggsf

Visualise sf objects
aes

Construct aesthetic mappings
last_plot

Retrieve the last plot to be modified or created.
ggtheme

Complete themes
aes_

Define aesthetic mappings programmatically
is.ggplot

Reports whether x is a ggplot object
msleep

An updated and expanded version of the mammals sleep dataset
faithfuld

2d density estimate of Old Faithful data
position_dodge

Dodge overlapping objects side-to-side
is.rel

Reports whether x is a rel object
geom_abline

Reference lines: horizontal, vertical, and diagonal
qplot

Quick plot
geom_bar

Bar charts
annotation_logticks

Annotation: log tick marks
geom_path

Connect observations
reexports

Objects exported from other packages
position_jitterdodge

Simultaneously dodge and jitter
position_nudge

Nudge points a fixed distance
annotation_map

Annotation: a maps
scale_x_discrete

Position scales for discrete data
scale_date

Position scales for date/time data
geom_point

Points
scale_colour_continuous

Continuous colour scales
coord_cartesian

Cartesian coordinates
geom_rug

Rug plots in the margins
absoluteGrob

Absolute grob
coord_fixed

Cartesian coordinates with fixed "aspect ratio"
scale_type

Determine default scale type
add_theme

Modify properties of an element in a theme object
scale_continuous

Position scales for continuous data (x & y)
geom_segment

Line segments and curves
ggproto

Create a new ggproto object
expand_limits

Expand the plot limits, using data
expand_scale

Generate expansion vector for scales.
guides

Set guides for each scale
should_stop

Used in examples to illustrate when errors should occur.
stat_summary_2d

Bin and summarise in 2d (rectangle & hexagons)
stat_unique

Remove duplicates
ggsave

Save a ggplot (or other grid object) with sensible defaults
set_last_plot

Set the last plot to be fetched by lastplot()
hmisc

A selection of summary functions from Hmisc
annotate

Create an annotation layer
fortify

Fortify a model with data.
scale_colour_viridis_d

Viridis colour scales from viridisLite
labellers

Useful labeller functions
labeller

Construct labelling specification
stat_ecdf

Compute empirical cumulative distribution
update_labels

Update axis/legend labels
stat_ellipse

Compute normal confidence ellipses
annotation_custom

Annotation: Custom grob
vars

Quote faceting variables
geom_density

Smoothed density estimates
geom_count

Count overlapping points
fortify.lm

Supplement the data fitted to a linear model with model fit statistics.
geom_crossbar

Vertical intervals: lines, crossbars & errorbars
geom_map

Polygons from a reference map
coord_flip

Cartesian coordinates with x and y flipped
scale_linetype

Scale for line patterns
midwest

Midwest demographics
mpg

Fuel economy data from 1999 and 2008 for 38 popular models of car
scale_manual

Create your own discrete scale
coord_map

Map projections
geom_quantile

Quantile regression
margin

Theme elements
geom_ribbon

Ribbons and area plots
element_grob

Generate grid grob from theme element
seals

Vector field of seal movements
sec_axis

Specify a secondary axis
geom_boxplot

A box and whiskers plot (in the style of Tukey)
fortify.map

Fortify method for map objects
fortify.sp

Fortify method for classes from the sp package.
ggplot2-ggproto

Base ggproto classes for ggplot2
ggplot2-package

ggplot2: Create Elegant Data Visualisations Using the Grammar of Graphics
geom_contour

2d contours of a 3d surface
lims

Set scale limits
luv_colours

colors() in Luv space
position_identity

Don't adjust position
stat_sf_coordinates

Extract coordinates from 'sf' objects
geom_freqpoly

Histograms and frequency polygons
geom_jitter

Jittered points
position_jitter

Jitter points to avoid overplotting
ggplot_build

Build ggplot for rendering.
aes_linetype_size_shape

Differentiation related aesthetics: linetype, size, shape
aes_position

Position related aesthetics: x, y, xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax, xend, yend
render_strips

Render panel strips
ggplot_gtable

Build a plot with all the usual bits and pieces.
borders

Create a layer of map borders
resolution

Compute the "resolution" of a numeric vector
stat_summary_bin

Summarise y values at unique/binned x
scale_colour_hue

Evenly spaced colours for discrete data
scale_identity

Use values without scaling
calc_element

Calculate the element properties, by inheriting properties from its parents
facet_grid

Lay out panels in a grid
is.Coord

Is this object a coordinate system?
is.facet

Is this object a faceting specification?
facet_null

Facet specification: a single panel.
geom_polygon

Polygons
geom_qq_line

A quantile-quantile plot
geom_label

Text
layer

Create a new layer
limits

Generate correct scale type for specified limits
zeroGrob

The zero grob draws nothing and has zero size.
tidyeval

Tidy eval helpers
map_data

Create a data frame of map data
max_height

Get the maximal width/length of a list of grobs
transform_position

Convenience function to transform all position variables.
position_stack

Stack overlapping objects on top of each another
waiver

A waiver object.
geom_raster

Rectangles
graphical-units

Graphical units
guide-exts

S3 generics for guides.
is.theme

Reports whether x is a theme object
wrap_dims

Arrange 1d structure into a grid
presidential

Terms of 11 presidents from Eisenhower to Obama
label_bquote

Label with mathematical expressions
scale_alpha

Alpha transparency scales
scale_colour_brewer

Sequential, diverging and qualitative colour scales from colorbrewer.org
mean_se

Calculate mean and standard error
scale_shape

Scales for shapes, aka glyphs
merge_element

Merge a parent element into a child element
scale_size

Scales for area or radius
standardise_aes_names

Standardise aesthetic names
print.ggplot

Explicitly draw plot
print.ggproto

Format or print a ggproto object
stat

Calculated aesthetics
summarise_plot

Summarise built plot objects
summary.ggplot

Displays a useful description of a ggplot object
remove_missing

Convenience function to remove missing values from a data.frame
txhousing

Housing sales in TX
render_axes

Render panel axes
update_geom_defaults

Modify geom/stat aesthetic defaults for future plots
scale_colour_gradient

Gradient colour scales
scale_colour_grey

Sequential grey colour scales
stat_function

Compute function for each x value
stat_identity

Leave data as is
theme

Modify components of a theme
theme_get

Get, set, and modify the active theme
translate_qplot_ggplot

Translating between qplot and ggplot
translate_qplot_lattice

Translating between qplot and lattice