Note
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Date tick locators and formatters#
This example illustrates the usage and effect of the various date locators and formatters.
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
# While these appear unused directly, they are used from eval'd strings.
from matplotlib.dates import (
FR,
MO,
MONTHLY,
SA,
SU,
TH,
TU,
WE,
AutoDateFormatter,
AutoDateLocator,
ConciseDateFormatter,
DateFormatter,
DayLocator,
HourLocator,
MicrosecondLocator,
MinuteLocator,
MonthLocator,
RRuleLocator,
SecondLocator,
WeekdayLocator,
YearLocator,
rrulewrapper,
)
import matplotlib.ticker as ticker
def plot_axis(ax, locator=None, xmax='2002-02-01', fmt=None, formatter=None):
"""Set up common parameters for the Axes in the example."""
ax.spines[['left', 'right', 'top']].set_visible(False)
ax.yaxis.set_major_locator(ticker.NullLocator())
ax.tick_params(which='major', width=1.00, length=5)
ax.tick_params(which='minor', width=0.75, length=2.5)
ax.set_xlim(np.datetime64('2000-02-01'), np.datetime64(xmax))
if locator:
ax.xaxis.set_major_locator(eval(locator))
ax.xaxis.set_major_formatter(DateFormatter(fmt))
else:
ax.xaxis.set_major_formatter(eval(formatter))
ax.text(0.0, 0.2, locator or formatter, transform=ax.transAxes,
fontsize=14, fontname='Monospace', color='tab:blue')
Date tick locators#
locators = [
# locator as str, xmax, fmt
('AutoDateLocator(maxticks=8)', '2003-02-01', '%Y-%m'),
('YearLocator(month=4)', '2003-02-01', '%Y-%m'),
('MonthLocator(bymonth=[4, 8, 12])', '2003-02-01', '%Y-%m'),
('DayLocator(interval=180)', '2003-02-01', '%Y-%m-%d'),
('WeekdayLocator(byweekday=SU, interval=4)', '2000-07-01', '%a %Y-%m-%d'),
('HourLocator(byhour=range(0, 24, 6))', '2000-02-04', '%H h'),
('MinuteLocator(interval=15)', '2000-02-01 02:00', '%H:%M'),
('SecondLocator(bysecond=(0, 30))', '2000-02-01 00:02', '%H:%M:%S'),
('MicrosecondLocator(interval=1000)', '2000-02-01 00:00:00.005', '%S.%f'),
('RRuleLocator(rrulewrapper(freq=MONTHLY, \nbyweekday=(MO, TU, WE, TH, FR), '
'bysetpos=-1))', '2000-07-01', '%Y-%m-%d'),
]
fig, axs = plt.subplots(len(locators), 1, figsize=(8, len(locators) * .8),
layout='constrained')
fig.suptitle('Date Locators')
for ax, (locator, xmax, fmt) in zip(axs, locators):
plot_axis(ax, locator, xmax, fmt)

Date formatters#
formatters = [
'AutoDateFormatter(ax.xaxis.get_major_locator())',
'ConciseDateFormatter(ax.xaxis.get_major_locator())',
'DateFormatter("%b %Y")',
]
fig, axs = plt.subplots(len(formatters), 1, figsize=(8, len(formatters) * .8),
layout='constrained')
fig.suptitle('Date Formatters')
for ax, fmt in zip(axs, formatters):
plot_axis(ax, formatter=fmt)

References
The use of the following functions, methods, classes and modules is shown in this example:
Total running time of the script: (0 minutes 5.046 seconds)