python - How to make sure that both x and y axes of plot are of equal sizes?

Question

I want to make x and y axes be of equal lengths (i.e the plot minus the legend should be square ). I wish to plot the legend outside (I have already been able to put legend outside the box). The span of x axis in the data (x_max - x_min) is not the same as the span of y axis in the data (y_max - y_min).

This is the relevant part of the code that I have at the moment:

plt.legend(loc='center left', bbox_to_anchor=(1, 0.5), fontsize=15 )
plt.axis('equal')
plt.tight_layout()

The following link is an example of an output plot that I am getting : plot

How can I do this?

Answer 1

Would plt.axis('scaled') be what you're after? That would produce a square plot, if the data limits are of equal difference.

If they are not, you could get a square plot by setting the aspect of the axes to the ratio of xlimits and ylimits.

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

fig, (ax1, ax2) = plt.subplots(1,2)

ax1.plot([-2.5, 2.5], [-4,13], "s-")
ax1.axis("scaled")

ax2.plot([-2.5, 2.5], [-4,13], "s-")
ax2.set_aspect(np.diff(ax2.get_xlim())/np.diff(ax2.get_ylim()))

plt.show()