A ggplot-inspired scatterplot function for Python

less than 1 minute read

I coded for a couple of years in R but switched over to Python almost a year ago. I have to say that I miss R’s ggplot2. Like a lot.

I’m learning Python more and more but I don’t think Python data visualizations are as easy as Hadley Wickham’s R package. Don’t get me wrong. Matplotlib and Seaborn have great features. However, it’s not always easy to figure out how to communicate the full meaning of a plot.

For example, a full-featured scatter plot would take advantage of marker size and marker color options. While displaying marker size and marker color is not difficult, placing a legend for interpretation of both is not as simple as when using ggplot2 in R.

Therefore, I wrote my own scatter plot function using matplotlib underneath the hood. You can find my Jupyter notebook for this function here.