How to change color of facet borders when using facet_grid

Question

When using facet_grid, ggplot2 divides the major categories that make up the facet variables with a broader-than-usual white line. This serves most purposes well. Sometimes I want to more clearly show the divisions between these major categorizations and would like to shade the facet division with another color. Is there a way to do that? Thanks.

Answer 1

Although a year late, I found this to be an easy fix:

ggplot(mpg, aes(cty, hwy, color = factor(year)))+ 
  geom_point()+
  facet_grid(cyl ~ drv) +
  theme(panel.margin=unit(.05, "lines"),
        panel.border = element_rect(color = "black", fill = NA, size = 1), 
        strip.background = element_rect(color = "black", size = 1))

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UPDATE 2021-06-01

---

As of ggplot2 3.3.3, the property panel.margin is deprecated, and we should use panel.spacing instead. Therefore, the code should be:

ggplot(mpg, aes(cty, hwy, color = factor(year)))+ 
  geom_point()+
  facet_grid(cyl ~ drv) +
  theme(panel.spacing = unit(.05, "lines"),
        panel.border = element_rect(color = "black", fill = NA, size = 1), 
        strip.background = element_rect(color = "black", size = 1))

Answer 2

You might need to use ggplot's layout table and gtable functions.

library(ggplot2)
library(gtable)
library(grid)

p <- ggplot(mtcars, aes(mpg, wt)) + geom_point() + 
     facet_grid(am ~ cyl)
## Get the plot grob
gt <- ggplotGrob(p)

## Check the layout
gtable_show_layout(gt)   # Vertical gaps are in columns 5 and 7
                         # and span rows 4 to 9
                         # Horizontal gap is in row 8
                         # and spans columns 4 to 9


## To automate the selection of the relevant rows and columns:
## Find the panels in the layout
## (t, l, b, r refer to top, left, bottom, right);
## The gaps' indices are one to the right of the panels' r index (except the right most panel);
## and one below the panels' b index (except the bottom most panel);
## Rmin and Rmax give the span of the horizontal gap;
## Bmin and Bmax give the span of the vertical gap;
## cols and rows are the columns and row indices of the gaps.

panels = subset(gt$layout, grepl("panel", gt$layout$name), t:r)

# The span of the horizontal gap
Rmin = min(panels$r)
Rmax = max(panels$r) + 1

#The span of the vertical gap
Bmin = min(panels$t) - 1
Bmax = max(panels$t)

# The columns and rows of the gaps
cols = unique(panels$r)[-length(unique(panels$r))] + 1
rows = unique(panels$t)[-length(unique(panels$t))] + 1

# The grob - orange rectangle
g = rectGrob(gp = gpar(col = NA, fill = "orange"))

## Add orange rectangles into the vertical and horizontal gaps
gt <- gtable_add_grob(gt, 
      rep(list(g), length(cols)),
      t=Bmin, l=cols, b=Bmax)

gt <- gtable_add_grob(gt, 
      rep(list(g), length(rows)),
      t=rows, l=Rmin, r=Rmax)

## Draw it
grid.newpage()
grid.draw(gt)