Reduce left and right margins in matplotlib plot

Question

One way to automatically do this is the bbox_inches='tight' kwarg to plt.savefig.

E.g.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
data = np.arange(3000).reshape((100,30))
plt.imshow(data)
plt.savefig('test.png', bbox_inches='tight')

Another way is to use fig.tight_layout()

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np

xs = np.linspace(0, 1, 20); ys = np.sin(xs)

fig = plt.figure()
axes = fig.add_subplot(1,1,1)
axes.plot(xs, ys)

# This should be called after all axes have been added
fig.tight_layout()
fig.savefig('test.png')

You can adjust the spacing around matplotlib figures using the subplots_adjust() function:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
plt.plot(whatever)
plt.subplots_adjust(left=0.1, right=0.9, top=0.9, bottom=0.1)

This will work for both the figure on screen and saved to a file, and it is the right function to call even if you don't have multiple plots on the one figure.

The numbers are fractions of the figure dimensions, and will need to be adjusted to allow for the figure labels.

All you need is

plt.tight_layout()

before your output.

In addition to cutting down the margins, this also tightly groups the space between any subplots:

x = [1,2,3]
y = [1,4,9]
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
fig = plt.figure()
subplot1 = fig.add_subplot(121)
subplot1.plot(x,y)
subplot2 = fig.add_subplot(122)
subplot2.plot(y,x)
fig.tight_layout()
plt.show()

Sometimes, the plt.tight_layout() doesn't give me the best view or the view I want. Then why don't plot with arbitrary margin first and do fixing the margin after plot? Since we got nice WYSIWYG from there.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(8,8))

plt.plot([2,5,7,8,5,3,5,7,])
plt.show()

Then paste settings into margin function to make it permanent:

fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(8,8))

plt.plot([2,5,7,8,5,3,5,7,])
fig.subplots_adjust(
    top=0.981,
    bottom=0.049,
    left=0.042,
    right=0.981,
    hspace=0.2,
    wspace=0.2
)
plt.show()

Just use ax = fig.add_axes([left, bottom, width, height]) if you want exact control of the figure layout. eg.

left = 0.05
bottom = 0.05
width = 0.9
height = 0.9
ax = fig.add_axes([left, bottom, width, height])

In case anybody wonders how how to get rid of the rest of the white margin after applying plt.tight_layout() or fig.tight_layout(): With the parameter pad (which is 1.08 by default), you're able to make it even tighter: "Padding between the figure edge and the edges of subplots, as a fraction of the font size." So for example

plt.tight_layout(pad=0.05)

will reduce it to a very small margin. Putting 0 doesn't work for me, as it makes the box of the subplot be cut off a little, too.