How can I change datetime format of x-axis values in matplotlib using python?

Question

How can I make this plot's x-axis looks better?

Is there any way to show only 3 values in x-axis while plotting all values in my dataframe?

I tried using plt.xticks(rotation=70) but it still cuts my numbers..

As you can see, it shows the date in the format MMM DD YYYY.

I wanna something like MMM DD or DD MMM. Or even writing in 2 lines DD MM \n YYYY.

How can I achieve that?

This is the code used for generating the chart:

plt.plot(df_21d["Timestamp"], df_21d["Close"], label="Price", color="b")    

plt.title("BTC - 21 Dias")

plt.xlabel("Data")
plt.ylabel("Preco (em USD)")

plt.grid(True)

plt.show()

Here's my data:

df_21d["Timestamp"]

667   2016-05-27 08:00:00
668   2016-05-27 08:30:00
669   2016-05-27 09:00:00
670   2016-05-27 09:30:00
671   2016-05-27 10:00:00
Name: Timestamp, dtype: datetime64[ns]

df_21d["Close"]

667    480.00
668    471.36
669    477.35
670    476.55
671    479.92
Name: Close, dtype: float64

I dont know if I have to format df_21d.Timestamp or if it's a matplotlib configuration. Maybe formatting the timestamp and passing it as a vector using plt.xticks()... but I'm not sure about how do that...

Or maybe even inserting only the first, the last and the middle value for the x-axis, with something like:

plt.xaxis_labels = (df_21d["Timestamp"][1], 
             df_21d["Timestamp"][len(df_21d["Timestamp"])/2], 
             df_21d["Timestamp"][len(df_21d["Timestamp"])])

I know this is not a solution to your actual problem, but I would recommend you to think about using less ticks. 5-7 should be enough to give the reader a good impression of the scale and it makes your plot less cluttered. — Ian
– Ian, Commented Jun 17, 2016 at 11:03
@ian_itor I've updated my question. Is there any way to show - as you said - only 3 values in x-axis? I don't wanna use only 3 ticks, I wanna plot all ticks (don't wanna interpolate my data) but show only the first, last and the middle tick timestamp value in x-axis, is this possible? — dot.Py
– dot.Py, Commented Apr 14, 2017 at 14:52

Anne · Accepted Answer · 2018-02-15 10:12:35Z

2

This answer might help you: Not write out all dates on an axis, Matplotlib

Essentially, you can set the format of dates by setting the format:

plt.gca().xaxis.set_major_formatter(mdates.DateFormatter('%d %m'))

answered Feb 15, 2018 at 10:12

Anne

5937 silver badges16 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

How can I change datetime format of x-axis values in matplotlib using python?

1 Answer 1

Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related