ylabel
Label y-axis
Description
ylabel(
labels the y-axis
of the current axes or standalone visualization. Reissuing the
txt
)ylabel
command causes the new label to replace the old
label.
ylabel(___,
modifies
the label appearance using one or more name-value pair arguments.
For example, Name,Value
)'FontSize',12
sets the font size to
12 points. Specify name-value pair arguments after all other input
arguments. Modifying the label appearance is not supported for all
types of charts.
returns the text object used as the y-axis label.
Use t
= ylabel(___)t
to make future modifications to the label
after it is created.
Examples
Label y-Axis
Label y-Axis with Numeric Input
Create Multiline Label
Create a multiline label using a multiline cell array.
figure plot((1:10).^2) ylabel({2010;'Population';'in Years'})
Include Superscript and Subscript in Axis Labels
Use the '^'
and '_'
characters to include superscripts and subscripts in the axis labels. Use curly braces {}
to modify more than one character.
t = linspace(0,1); y = exp(t); plot(t,y) xlabel('t_{seconds}') ylabel('e^t')
Create y-Axis Label and Set Font Properties
Use Name,Value
pairs to set the font size, font weight, and text color properties of the y-axis label.
figure plot((1:10).^2) ylabel('Population','FontSize',12,... 'FontWeight','bold','Color','r')
'FontSize',12
displays the label text in 12-point font. 'FontWeight','bold'
makes the text bold. 'Color','r'
sets the text color to red.
Label y-Axis of Specific Axes
Starting in R2019b, you can display a tiling of plots using the tiledlayout
and nexttile
functions. Call the tiledlayout
function to create a 2-by-1 tiled chart layout. Call the nexttile
function to create the axes objects ax1
and ax2
. Plot data into each axes, and create an y-axis label for the top plot.
tiledlayout(2,1)
ax1 = nexttile;
plot((1:10).^2)
ylabel(ax1,'Population')
ax2 = nexttile;
plot((1:10).^3)
Label y-Axis and Return Object Handle
Label the y-axis and return the handle to the text object used as the label.
plot((1:10).^2)
t = ylabel('Population');
Set the color of the label to red. Use dot notation to set properties.
t.Color = 'red';
Rotated y-Axis Label
Since R2023a
You can rotate a y-axis label so that it reads from left-to-right by setting the Rotation
property of the label to 0
degrees. By default, y-axis labels have a Rotation
value of 90
degrees. When you rotate a label, its HorizontalAlignment
and VerticalAlignment
properties automatically change to prevent overlap with the axes.
Create a plot. Then add a y-axis label with a rotation angle of 0
degrees.
plot((1:10)) mylabel = ylabel("Population","Rotation",0);
Input Arguments
txt
— Axis label
string scalar | character vector | string array | character array | cell array | categorical array | numeric value
Axis label, specified as a string scalar, character vector, string array, character array, cell array, categorical array, or numeric value.
Example: 'my label'
Example: {'first
line','second line'}
Example: 123
To include numeric variables with text in a label, use the num2str
function. For example:
x = 42;
txt = ['The value is ',num2str(x)];
To include special characters, such as superscripts, subscripts,
Greek letters, or mathematical symbols use TeX markup. For a list
of supported markup, see the Interpreter
property.
To create multiline labels:
Use a string array, where each element contains a line of text, such as
["first line","second line"]
.Use a cell array, where each cell contains a line of text, such as
{'first line','second line'}
.Use a character array, where each row contains the same number of characters, such as
['abc'; 'ab ']
.Use
sprintf
to create text with a new line character, such assprintf('first line \n second line')
.
Numeric labels are converted to text using sprintf('%g',value)
.
For example, 12345678
displays as 1.23457e+07
.
Note
If you specify the label as a categorical array, MATLAB® uses the values in the array, not the categories.
The words
default
,factory
, andremove
are reserved words that will not appear in a label when quoted as a normal characters. To display any of these words individually, precede them with a backslash, such as'\default'
or'\remove'
.
target
— Target for label
Axes
object | TiledChartLayout
object | standalone visualization | array of objects
Target for label, specified as one of the following:
If you do not specify the target, then the ylabel
function adds the label to the graphics object returned by the
gca
command.
Note
Standalone visualizations do not support modifying the label appearance, such as the color, or returning the text object as an output argument.
Name-Value Arguments
Specify optional pairs of arguments as
Name1=Value1,...,NameN=ValueN
, where Name
is
the argument name and Value
is the corresponding value.
Name-value arguments must appear after other arguments, but the order of the
pairs does not matter.
Before R2021a, use commas to separate each name and value, and enclose
Name
in quotes.
Example: 'Color','red','FontSize',12
specifies
red, 12-point font.
In addition to the following, you can specify other text object
properties using Name,Value
pair arguments. See Text Properties.
FontSize
— Font size
11
(default) | scalar value greater than 0
Font size, specified as a scalar value greater than 0
in
point units. One point equals 1/72 inch. To change the font units,
use the FontUnits
property.
Setting the font size properties for the associated axes also
affects the label font size. The label font size updates to equal
the axes font size times the label scale factor. The FontSize
property
of the axes contains the axes font size. The LabelFontSizeMultiplier
property
of the axes contains the label scale factor. By default, the axes
font size is 10 points and the scale factor is 1.1, so the y-axis
label font size is 11 points.
Data Types: single
| double
| int8
| int16
| int32
| int64
| uint8
| uint16
| uint32
| uint64
FontWeight
— Character thickness
'normal'
(default) | 'bold'
Character thickness, specified as 'normal'
or
'bold'
.
MATLAB uses the FontWeight
property to select a font from
those available on your system. Not all fonts have a bold weight. Therefore, specifying
a bold font weight can still result in the normal font weight.
FontName
— Font name
supported font name | "FixedWidth"
Font name, specified as a supported font name or "FixedWidth"
. To display
and print text properly, you must choose a font that your system supports. The default
font depends on your operating system and locale.
To use a fixed-width font that looks good in any locale, use "FixedWidth"
.
The fixed-width font relies on the root FixedWidthFontName
property. Setting the root FixedWidthFontName
property causes an
immediate update of the display to use the new font.
Color
— Text color
[0.15 0.15 0.15]
(default) | RGB triplet | hexadecimal color code | 'r'
| 'g'
| 'b'
| ...
Text color, specified as an RGB triplet, a hexadecimal color code, a color name, or a short name.
For a custom color, specify an RGB triplet or a hexadecimal color code.
An RGB triplet is a three-element row vector whose elements specify the intensities of the red, green, and blue components of the color. The intensities must be in the range
[0,1]
, for example,[0.4 0.6 0.7]
.A hexadecimal color code is a string scalar or character vector that starts with a hash symbol (
#
) followed by three or six hexadecimal digits, which can range from0
toF
. The values are not case sensitive. Therefore, the color codes"#FF8800"
,"#ff8800"
,"#F80"
, and"#f80"
are equivalent.
Alternatively, you can specify some common colors by name. This table lists the named color options, the equivalent RGB triplets, and hexadecimal color codes.
Color Name | Short Name | RGB Triplet | Hexadecimal Color Code | Appearance |
---|---|---|---|---|
"red" | "r" | [1 0 0] | "#FF0000" | |
"green" | "g" | [0 1 0] | "#00FF00" | |
"blue" | "b" | [0 0 1] | "#0000FF" | |
"cyan"
| "c" | [0 1 1] | "#00FFFF" | |
"magenta" | "m" | [1 0 1] | "#FF00FF" | |
"yellow" | "y" | [1 1 0] | "#FFFF00" | |
"black" | "k" | [0 0 0] | "#000000" | |
"white" | "w" | [1 1 1] | "#FFFFFF" | |
"none" | Not applicable | Not applicable | Not applicable | No color |
Here are the RGB triplets and hexadecimal color codes for the default colors MATLAB uses in many types of plots.
RGB Triplet | Hexadecimal Color Code | Appearance |
---|---|---|
[0 0.4470 0.7410] | "#0072BD" | |
[0.8500 0.3250 0.0980] | "#D95319" | |
[0.9290 0.6940 0.1250] | "#EDB120" | |
[0.4940 0.1840 0.5560] | "#7E2F8E" | |
[0.4660 0.6740 0.1880] | "#77AC30" | |
[0.3010 0.7450 0.9330] | "#4DBEEE" | |
[0.6350 0.0780 0.1840] | "#A2142F" |
Example: 'blue'
Example: [0 0 1]
Example: '#0000FF'
Rotation
— Text orientation
scalar value in degrees
Text orientation, specified as a scalar value in degrees. A rotation value of 0 degrees makes the text horizontal. For vertical text, set this property to 90
or -90
. Positive values rotate the text counterclockwise. Negative values rotate the text clockwise.
Data Types: single
| double
| int8
| int16
| int32
| int64
| uint8
| uint16
| uint32
| uint64
Interpreter
— Text interpreter
'tex'
(default) | 'latex'
| 'none'
Text interpreter, specified as one of these values:
'tex'
— Interpret characters using a subset of TeX markup.'latex'
— Interpret characters using LaTeX markup.'none'
— Display literal characters.
TeX Markup
By default, MATLAB supports a subset of TeX markup. Use TeX markup to add superscripts and subscripts, modify the font type and color, and include special characters in the text.
Modifiers remain in effect until the end of the text.
Superscripts and subscripts are an exception because they modify only the next character or the
characters within the curly braces. When you set the interpreter to 'tex'
,
the supported modifiers are as follows.
Modifier | Description | Example |
---|---|---|
^{ } | Superscript | 'text^{superscript}' |
_{ } | Subscript | 'text_{subscript}' |
\bf | Bold font | '\bf text' |
\it | Italic font | '\it text' |
\sl | Oblique font (usually the same as italic font) | '\sl text' |
\rm | Normal font | '\rm text' |
\fontname{ | Font name — Replace
with the name of
a font family. You can use this in combination with other modifiers. | '\fontname{Courier} text' |
\fontsize{ | Font size —Replace
with a numeric
scalar value in point units. | '\fontsize{15} text' |
\color{ | Font color — Replace
with one of
these colors: red , green ,
yellow , magenta ,
blue , black ,
white , gray ,
darkGreen , orange , or
lightBlue . | '\color{magenta} text' |
\color[rgb]{specifier} | Custom font color — Replace
with a
three-element RGB triplet. | '\color[rgb]{0,0.5,0.5} text' |
This table lists the supported special characters for the
'tex'
interpreter.
Character Sequence | Symbol | Character Sequence | Symbol | Character Sequence | Symbol |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
| α |
| υ |
| ~ |
| ∠ |
| ϕ |
| ≤ |
|
|
| χ |
| ∞ |
| β |
| ψ |
| ♣ |
| γ |
| ω |
| ♦ |
| δ |
| Γ |
| ♥ |
| ϵ |
| Δ |
| ♠ |
| ζ |
| Θ |
| ↔ |
| η |
| Λ |
| ← |
| θ |
| Ξ |
| ⇐ |
| ϑ |
| Π |
| ↑ |
| ι |
| Σ |
| → |
| κ |
| ϒ |
| ⇒ |
| λ |
| Φ |
| ↓ |
| µ |
| Ψ |
| º |
| ν |
| Ω |
| ± |
| ξ |
| ∀ |
| ≥ |
| π |
| ∃ |
| ∝ |
| ρ |
| ∍ |
| ∂ |
| σ |
| ≅ |
| • |
| ς |
| ≈ |
| ÷ |
| τ |
| ℜ |
| ≠ |
| ≡ |
| ⊕ |
| ℵ |
| ℑ |
| ∪ |
| ℘ |
| ⊗ |
| ⊆ |
| ∅ |
| ∩ |
| ∈ |
| ⊇ |
| ⊃ |
| ⌈ |
| ⊂ |
| ∫ |
| · |
| ο |
| ⌋ |
| ¬ |
| ∇ |
| ⌊ |
| x |
| ... |
| ⊥ |
| √ |
| ´ |
| ∧ |
| ϖ |
| ∅ |
| ⌉ |
| 〉 |
| | |
| ∨ |
| 〈 |
| © |
LaTeX Markup
To use LaTeX markup, set the interpreter to 'latex'
. For inline
mode, surround the markup with single dollar signs ($
). For
display mode, surround the markup with double dollar signs
($$
).
LaTeX Mode | Example | Result |
---|---|---|
Inline |
'$\int_1^{20} x^2 dx$' |
|
Display |
'$$\int_1^{20} x^2 dx$$' |
|
The displayed text uses the default LaTeX font style. The
FontName
, FontWeight
, and
FontAngle
properties do not have an effect. To change the
font style, use LaTeX markup.
The maximum size of the text that you can use with the LaTeX interpreter is 1200 characters. For multiline text, this reduces by about 10 characters per line.
For examples that use TeX and LaTeX, see Greek Letters and Special Characters in Chart Text. For more information about the LaTeX system, see The LaTeX Project website at https://www.latex-project.org/.
Output Arguments
t
— Text object
text object
Text object used as the y-axis label. Use t
to
access and modify properties of the label after its created.
Tips
By default, the
Interactions
property containseditInteraction
so the text can be edited by clicking on the text. To disable this interaction, set theInteractions
property of the text object to[]
.
Version History
Introduced before R2006aR2023a: Rotate the y-axis label without overlapping the axes
When you change the Rotation
property of the
y-axis label in a 2-D plot, the
HorizontalAlignment
and the
VerticalAlignment
properties of the label automatically
change to prevent overlap between the label and the axes.
See Also
Functions
Properties
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