Search code examples
pythonmatplotlibtextplot-annotations

How to put text outside of plots


I am plotting two time series and computing varies indices for them.

How to write these indices for these plots outside the plot using annotation or text in python?

Below is my code

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

obs_graph=plt.plot(obs_df['cms'], '-r', label='Observed')
plt.legend(loc='best')
plt.hold(True)
sim_graph=plt.plot(sim_df['cms'], '-g', label="Simulated")
plt.legend(loc='best')
plt.ylabel('Daily Discharge (m^3/s)')
plt.xlabel('Year')
plt.title('Observed vs Simulated Daily Discharge')
textstr = 'NSE=%.2f\nRMSE=%.2f\n'%(NSE, RMSE)
# print textstr
plt.text(2000, 2000, textstr, fontsize=14)
plt.grid(True)
plt.show()

I want to print teststr outside the plots. Here is the current plot:

plot


Solution

  • It's probably best to define the position in figure coordinates instead of data coordinates as you'd probably not want the text to change its position when changing the data.

    Using figure coordinates can be done either by specifying the figure transform (fig.transFigure)

    plt.text(0.02, 0.5, textstr, fontsize=14, transform=plt.gcf().transFigure)
    

    or by using the text method of the figure instead of that of the axes.

    plt.gcf().text(0.02, 0.5, textstr, fontsize=14)
    

    In both cases the coordinates to place the text are in figure coordinates, where (0,0) is the bottom left and (1,1) is the top right of the figure.

    At the end you still may want to provide some extra space for the text to fit next to the axes, using plt.subplots_adjust(left=0.3) or so.