How to set default Matplotlib axis colour cycle

Question

The default axis colour cycle in Matplotlib 2.0 is called tab10:

I want to use a different qualitative colour cycle, such as tab20c:

I have used this code to change the default axis colour cycle:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from cycler import cycler

c = plt.get_cmap('tab20c').colors
plt.rcParams['axes.prop_cycle'] = cycler(color=c)

This looks pretty dirty to me. Is there a better way?

This answer shows a slightly different way; it's probably not better though. But unless you clearly define "better", it hard to know what you want really. — ImportanceOfBeingErnest
– ImportanceOfBeingErnest, Commented Sep 11, 2017 at 7:40
I was hoping for something like ax.set_color_cycle('tab10') — onewhaleid
– onewhaleid, Commented Sep 12, 2017 at 0:31
File "\AppData\Local\Continuum\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\rcsetup.py", line 395, in validate_color if s.find(',') >= 0: AttributeError: 'dict' object has no attribute 'find' — onewhaleid
– onewhaleid, Commented Sep 12, 2017 at 22:50
Sorry, I didn't test it, but it should be ax.set_prop_cycle(cycler(color=plt.get_cmap('tab20c').color‌s)) — ImportanceOfBeingErnest
– ImportanceOfBeingErnest, Commented Sep 13, 2017 at 7:48

ImportanceOfBeingErnest · Accepted Answer · 2017-09-13 12:42:43Z

6

As said in the comments, it's not clear what "better" would mean. So I can think of two different ways in addition to the one from the question, which works perfectly fine.

(a) use seaborn

Just to show a different way of setting the color cycler: Seaborn has a function set_palette, which does essentially set the matplotlib color cycle. You could use it like

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import seaborn as sns
sns.set_palette("tab20c",plt.cm.tab20c.N )

(b) set the cycler for the axes only

If you want the cycler for each axes individually, you may use ax.set_prop_cycle for an axes ax.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from cycler import cycler

fig, ax = plt.subplots()
ax.set_prop_cycle(cycler(color=plt.get_cmap('tab20c').color‌‌s))

edited Sep 13, 2017 at 12:42

answered Sep 11, 2017 at 9:28

ImportanceOfBeingErnest

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How to set default Matplotlib axis colour cycle

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(a) use seaborn

(b) set the cycler for the axes only

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(a) use seaborn

(b) set the cycler for the axes only

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