What is Matplotlib, how to install and use

Matplotlib Official Documentation

This guide only goes through the basics. Matplotlib is capable of much more, visit the official site for more details.

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Matplotlib is a powerful and flexible Python library used for creating static, animated, and interactive visualisations.
It’s especially popular in data science, engineering, and academic research for visualising numerical data.

Matplotlib can produce a wide range of chart types, including:

• Line charts – plt.plot()
• Scatter plots – plt.scatter()
• Bar charts – plt.bar(), plt.barh()
• Histograms – plt.hist()
• Pie charts – plt.pie()
• Boxplots & Violin plots – plt.boxplot(), plt.violinplot()
• Heatmaps & Images – plt.imshow()

Matplotlib offers deep control over:

• Titles, labels, legends: plt.title(), plt.xlabel(), plt.legend()
• Colours, markers, line styles
• Axes and scales: linear, log, polar, etc.
• Subplots and layout control: plt.subplot(), plt.subplots()
• Figure size and resolution: plt.figure(figsize=(w, h), dpi=100)

Installation:

Importing the library:

By convention, it’s always imported as plt.