python - Box around text in matplotlib

Question

how is possible to make a box around text in matplotlib? I have text on three different lines and in three different colors:

 ax.text(2,1, 'alpha', color='red')
 ax.text(2,2, 'beta', color='cyan')
 ax.text(2,3, 'epsilon', color='black')

I saw the tutorial http://matplotlib.org/users/recipes.html (last example) but I can't solve the problem. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

As the example you linked to mentions, you can use the bbox kwarg to add a box.

I assume you're confused on how to set the color, etc, of the box? As a quick example:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
fig, ax = plt.subplots()

ax.text(0.5, 0.8, 'Test', color='red', 
        bbox=dict(facecolor='none', edgecolor='red'))

ax.text(0.5, 0.6, 'Test', color='blue', 
        bbox=dict(facecolor='none', edgecolor='blue', pad=10.0))

ax.text(0.5, 0.4, 'Test', color='green', 
        bbox=dict(facecolor='none', edgecolor='green', boxstyle='round'))

ax.text(0.5, 0.2, 'Test', color='black', 
        bbox=dict(facecolor='none', edgecolor='black', boxstyle='round,pad=1'))

plt.show()

The last two are "Fancy" bbox patches, so the padding, etc is set in a different manner. (Which is rather annoying for simple things like padding, though it makes the implementation simpler behind-the-scenes.)

Also, if you're labeling things in your plot, you'll probably find that annotate is a better choice. Among other things, it allows you to place your text at an offsent in points from a particular data position.