How to plot a grid of histograms with Matplotlib in the order of the DataFrame columns?

Question

Considers the simple data frame below:

import pandas  as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

df = pd.DataFrame({'var3':[1,3,9,6,1,6,3,1,1,3],
                   'var1':[9,1,2,6,6,5,9,3,1,7],
                   'var2':[6,6,2,9,8,3,5,4,1,3]})
df

Now, let's plot a set of histograms from this data:

df.hist(layout=(1,3))
plt.show()

Note that the order (from left to right) of the histograms in the figure is different from the order of the columns in the data frame. How to make the histograms obey the order of its data source?

foglerit · Accepted Answer · 2020-04-09 22:12:52Z

1

I could not find a way to do that within the df.hist() function. But you can accomplish it with the simple loop below:

fig, ax = plt.subplots(1, len(df.columns), figsize=(3*len(df.columns), 3))
for i, var in enumerate(df):
    df[var].hist(ax=ax[i])
    ax[i].set_title(var)
plt.show()

Result:

answered Apr 9, 2020 at 22:12

foglerit

8,4469 gold badges53 silver badges70 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Comments

Arne · Accepted Answer · 2020-04-09 22:48:23Z

0

I like @foglerit's answer, but here's another workaround solution:

import pandas  as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

df = pd.DataFrame({'var3':[1,3,9,6,1,6,3,1,1,3],
                   'var1':[9,1,2,6,6,5,9,3,1,7],
                   'var2':[6,6,2,9,8,3,5,4,1,3]})

columns = df.columns  # save original column names
columns_temp = []  # create temporary column names, numbered
for i, col in enumerate(df.columns):
    columns_temp.append('(' + str(i+1) + ') ' + str(col))
df.columns = columns_temp

df.hist(layout=(1,3))  # now the column order is not messed up

df.columns = columns  # reassign original column names

answered Apr 9, 2020 at 22:48

Arne

10.6k2 gold badges22 silver badges31 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

How to plot a grid of histograms with Matplotlib in the order of the DataFrame columns?

2 Answers 2

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related