How do I plot in real-time in a while loop?

Question

I am trying to plot some data from a camera in real time using OpenCV. However, the real-time plotting (using matplotlib) doesn't seem to be working.

I've isolated the problem into this simple example:

fig = plt.figure()
plt.axis([0, 1000, 0, 1])

i = 0
x = list()
y = list()

while i < 1000:
    temp_y = np.random.random()
    x.append(i)
    y.append(temp_y)
    plt.scatter(i, temp_y)
    i += 1
    plt.show()

I would expect this example to plot 1000 points individually. What actually happens is that the window pops up with the first point showing (ok with that), then waits for the loop to finish before it populates the rest of the graph.

Any thoughts why I am not seeing points populated one at a time?

Precedency

Answer 1

Here's the working version of the code in question (requires at least version Matplotlib 1.1.0 from 2011-11-14):

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

plt.axis([0, 10, 0, 1])

for i in range(10):
    y = np.random.random()
    plt.scatter(i, y)
    plt.pause(0.05)

plt.show()

Note the call to plt.pause(0.05), which both draws the new data and runs the GUI's event loop (allowing for mouse interaction).

Corydalis

This worked for me in Python2. In Python3 it did not. It would pause the loop after rendering the plot window. But after moving the plt.show() method to after the loop... it resolved it for Python3, for me. – Calfskin

Weird, worked okay for me in Python 3 (ver 3.4.0) Matplotlib (ver 1.3.1) Numpy (ver 1.8.1) Ubuntu Linux 3.13.0 64-bit – Corydalis

this does not work with ipython='2.1.0', matplotlib='1.3.1'. the plot gets stuck – Homogeny

instead of plt.show() and plt.draw() just replace plt.draw() with plt.pause(0.1) – Homogeny

Did not work on Win64/Anaconda matplotlib.__version__ 1.5.0. An initial figure window opened, but did not display anything, it remained in a blocked state until I closed it – Macrae

regarding plt.pause() vs plt.draw() and time.sleep(0.05): draw/sleep still draws the plot but using draw/sleep prevents things like mouse resize window, mouse zoom, button events, any mouse interaction, etc. – Overshoot

This answer requires a-priori knowledge of the x/y data... which is not needed: I prefer 1. don't call plt.axis() but instead create two lists x and y and call plt.plot(x,y) 2. in your loop, append new data values to the two lists 3. call plt.gca().lines[0].set_xdata(x); plt.gca().lines[0].set_ydata(y); plt.gca().relim(); plt.gca().autoscale_view(); plt.pause(0.05); – Overshoot

with ipython 4.0.0 and matplotlib 1.5.1 copying and pasting this code doesn't work for me. – Stimulate

plt.pause() is not a wise choice since it triggers a full draw(). Use time.sleep() with canvas.flush_events() is much better. – Nostoc

I'd replace the last while loop, i.e. while True: plt.pause(0.5), with plt.ioff(); plt.show(). – Nobility

and how would you add legends here ? – Analog

You can also use plt.clf() after plt.close() to clear the previus figure to make the iteration faster – Highpitched

not work it create a lot of figures – Clavichord

Doesn't work with python 3. – Server

It would be better if all the new dots were able to be added to the same graph. – Antirachitic

Answer 2

If you're interested in realtime plotting, I'd recommend looking into matplotlib's animation API. In particular, using blit to avoid redrawing the background on every frame can give you substantial speed gains (~10x):

#!/usr/bin/env python

import numpy as np
import time
import matplotlib
matplotlib.use('GTKAgg')
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt


def randomwalk(dims=(256, 256), n=20, sigma=5, alpha=0.95, seed=1):
    """ A simple random walk with memory """

    r, c = dims
    gen = np.random.RandomState(seed)
    pos = gen.rand(2, n) * ((r,), (c,))
    old_delta = gen.randn(2, n) * sigma

    while True:
        delta = (1. - alpha) * gen.randn(2, n) * sigma + alpha * old_delta
        pos += delta
        for ii in xrange(n):
            if not (0. <= pos[0, ii] < r):
                pos[0, ii] = abs(pos[0, ii] % r)
            if not (0. <= pos[1, ii] < c):
                pos[1, ii] = abs(pos[1, ii] % c)
        old_delta = delta
        yield pos


def run(niter=1000, doblit=True):
    """
    Display the simulation using matplotlib, optionally using blit for speed
    """

    fig, ax = plt.subplots(1, 1)
    ax.set_aspect('equal')
    ax.set_xlim(0, 255)
    ax.set_ylim(0, 255)
    ax.hold(True)
    rw = randomwalk()
    x, y = rw.next()

    plt.show(False)
    plt.draw()

    if doblit:
        # cache the background
        background = fig.canvas.copy_from_bbox(ax.bbox)

    points = ax.plot(x, y, 'o')[0]
    tic = time.time()

    for ii in xrange(niter):

        # update the xy data
        x, y = rw.next()
        points.set_data(x, y)

        if doblit:
            # restore background
            fig.canvas.restore_region(background)

            # redraw just the points
            ax.draw_artist(points)

            # fill in the axes rectangle
            fig.canvas.blit(ax.bbox)

        else:
            # redraw everything
            fig.canvas.draw()

    plt.close(fig)
    print "Blit = %s, average FPS: %.2f" % (
        str(doblit), niter / (time.time() - tic))

if __name__ == '__main__':
    run(doblit=False)
    run(doblit=True)

Output:

Blit = False, average FPS: 54.37
Blit = True, average FPS: 438.27

Ascot

This looks nice, but where do you actually call "show" or display the graph? – Deplane

@bejota The original version was designed to work within an interactive matplotlib session. To make it work as a standalone script, it's necessary to 1) explicitly select a backend for matplotlib, and 2) to force the figure to be displayed and drawn before entering the animation loop using plt.show() and plt.draw(). I've added these changes to the code above. – Ascot

Is the intent/motivation of the blit() seems very much to be "improve real-time plotting"? If you have a matplotlib developer/blog discussing the why/purpose/intent/motivation that would be great. (seems like this new blit operation would convert Matplotlib from only use for offline or very slowly changing data to now you can use Matplotlib with very fast updating data... almost like an oscilloscope). – Overshoot

I have found that this approach makes the plot window unresponsive: I cannot interact with it, and doing so may crash it. – Shondrashone

'FigureCanvasMac' object has no attribute 'copy_from_bbox' – Xylia

For those getting "gtk not found" issue, it works fine with a different back-end (I used 'TKAgg'). To find a supported backed I used this solution: #3285693 – Cyclopentane

The link in this answer doesn't seem to work anymore. This might be an up-to-date link: scipy-cookbook.readthedocs.io/items/… – Virendra

This answer is hella outdated, if you want to manually update your animated plots, take a look at the official docs: matplotlib.org/stable/tutorials/advanced/blitting.html – Mundell

Answer 3

I know I'm a bit late to answer this question. Nevertheless, I've made some code a while ago to plot live graphs, that I would like to share:

Code for PyQt4:

###################################################################
#                                                                 #
#                    PLOT A LIVE GRAPH (PyQt4)                    #
#                  -----------------------------                  #
#            EMBED A MATPLOTLIB ANIMATION INSIDE YOUR             #
#            OWN GUI!                                             #
#                                                                 #
###################################################################


import sys
import os
from PyQt4 import QtGui
from PyQt4 import QtCore
import functools
import numpy as np
import random as rd
import matplotlib
matplotlib.use("Qt4Agg")
from matplotlib.figure import Figure
from matplotlib.animation import TimedAnimation
from matplotlib.lines import Line2D
from matplotlib.backends.backend_qt4agg import FigureCanvasQTAgg as FigureCanvas
import time
import threading


def setCustomSize(x, width, height):
    sizePolicy = QtGui.QSizePolicy(QtGui.QSizePolicy.Fixed, QtGui.QSizePolicy.Fixed)
    sizePolicy.setHorizontalStretch(0)
    sizePolicy.setVerticalStretch(0)
    sizePolicy.setHeightForWidth(x.sizePolicy().hasHeightForWidth())
    x.setSizePolicy(sizePolicy)
    x.setMinimumSize(QtCore.QSize(width, height))
    x.setMaximumSize(QtCore.QSize(width, height))

''''''

class CustomMainWindow(QtGui.QMainWindow):

    def __init__(self):

        super(CustomMainWindow, self).__init__()

        # Define the geometry of the main window
        self.setGeometry(300, 300, 800, 400)
        self.setWindowTitle("my first window")

        # Create FRAME_A
        self.FRAME_A = QtGui.QFrame(self)
        self.FRAME_A.setStyleSheet("QWidget { background-color: %s }" % QtGui.QColor(210,210,235,255).name())
        self.LAYOUT_A = QtGui.QGridLayout()
        self.FRAME_A.setLayout(self.LAYOUT_A)
        self.setCentralWidget(self.FRAME_A)

        # Place the zoom button
        self.zoomBtn = QtGui.QPushButton(text = 'zoom')
        setCustomSize(self.zoomBtn, 100, 50)
        self.zoomBtn.clicked.connect(self.zoomBtnAction)
        self.LAYOUT_A.addWidget(self.zoomBtn, *(0,0))

        # Place the matplotlib figure
        self.myFig = CustomFigCanvas()
        self.LAYOUT_A.addWidget(self.myFig, *(0,1))

        # Add the callbackfunc to ..
        myDataLoop = threading.Thread(name = 'myDataLoop', target = dataSendLoop, daemon = True, args = (self.addData_callbackFunc,))
        myDataLoop.start()

        self.show()

    ''''''


    def zoomBtnAction(self):
        print("zoom in")
        self.myFig.zoomIn(5)

    ''''''

    def addData_callbackFunc(self, value):
        # print("Add data: " + str(value))
        self.myFig.addData(value)



''' End Class '''


class CustomFigCanvas(FigureCanvas, TimedAnimation):

    def __init__(self):

        self.addedData = []
        print(matplotlib.__version__)

        # The data
        self.xlim = 200
        self.n = np.linspace(0, self.xlim - 1, self.xlim)
        a = []
        b = []
        a.append(2.0)
        a.append(4.0)
        a.append(2.0)
        b.append(4.0)
        b.append(3.0)
        b.append(4.0)
        self.y = (self.n * 0.0) + 50

        # The window
        self.fig = Figure(figsize=(5,5), dpi=100)
        self.ax1 = self.fig.add_subplot(111)


        # self.ax1 settings
        self.ax1.set_xlabel('time')
        self.ax1.set_ylabel('raw data')
        self.line1 = Line2D([], [], color='blue')
        self.line1_tail = Line2D([], [], color='red', linewidth=2)
        self.line1_head = Line2D([], [], color='red', marker='o', markeredgecolor='r')
        self.ax1.add_line(self.line1)
        self.ax1.add_line(self.line1_tail)
        self.ax1.add_line(self.line1_head)
        self.ax1.set_xlim(0, self.xlim - 1)
        self.ax1.set_ylim(0, 100)


        FigureCanvas.__init__(self, self.fig)
        TimedAnimation.__init__(self, self.fig, interval = 50, blit = True)

    def new_frame_seq(self):
        return iter(range(self.n.size))

    def _init_draw(self):
        lines = [self.line1, self.line1_tail, self.line1_head]
        for l in lines:
            l.set_data([], [])

    def addData(self, value):
        self.addedData.append(value)

    def zoomIn(self, value):
        bottom = self.ax1.get_ylim()[0]
        top = self.ax1.get_ylim()[1]
        bottom += value
        top -= value
        self.ax1.set_ylim(bottom,top)
        self.draw()


    def _step(self, *args):
        # Extends the _step() method for the TimedAnimation class.
        try:
            TimedAnimation._step(self, *args)
        except Exception as e:
            self.abc += 1
            print(str(self.abc))
            TimedAnimation._stop(self)
            pass

    def _draw_frame(self, framedata):
        margin = 2
        while(len(self.addedData) > 0):
            self.y = np.roll(self.y, -1)
            self.y[-1] = self.addedData[0]
            del(self.addedData[0])


        self.line1.set_data(self.n[ 0 : self.n.size - margin ], self.y[ 0 : self.n.size - margin ])
        self.line1_tail.set_data(np.append(self.n[-10:-1 - margin], self.n[-1 - margin]), np.append(self.y[-10:-1 - margin], self.y[-1 - margin]))
        self.line1_head.set_data(self.n[-1 - margin], self.y[-1 - margin])
        self._drawn_artists = [self.line1, self.line1_tail, self.line1_head]

''' End Class '''

# You need to setup a signal slot mechanism, to 
# send data to your GUI in a thread-safe way.
# Believe me, if you don't do this right, things
# go very very wrong..
class Communicate(QtCore.QObject):
    data_signal = QtCore.pyqtSignal(float)

''' End Class '''


def dataSendLoop(addData_callbackFunc):
    # Setup the signal-slot mechanism.
    mySrc = Communicate()
    mySrc.data_signal.connect(addData_callbackFunc)

    # Simulate some data
    n = np.linspace(0, 499, 500)
    y = 50 + 25*(np.sin(n / 8.3)) + 10*(np.sin(n / 7.5)) - 5*(np.sin(n / 1.5))
    i = 0

    while(True):
        if(i > 499):
            i = 0
        time.sleep(0.1)
        mySrc.data_signal.emit(y[i]) # <- Here you emit a signal!
        i += 1
    ###
###


if __name__== '__main__':
    app = QtGui.QApplication(sys.argv)
    QtGui.QApplication.setStyle(QtGui.QStyleFactory.create('Plastique'))
    myGUI = CustomMainWindow()
    sys.exit(app.exec_())

''''''

 
I recently rewrote the code for PyQt5.
Code for PyQt5:

###################################################################
#                                                                 #
#                    PLOT A LIVE GRAPH (PyQt5)                    #
#                  -----------------------------                  #
#            EMBED A MATPLOTLIB ANIMATION INSIDE YOUR             #
#            OWN GUI!                                             #
#                                                                 #
###################################################################

import sys
import os
from PyQt5.QtWidgets import *
from PyQt5.QtCore import *
from PyQt5.QtGui import *
import functools
import numpy as np
import random as rd
import matplotlib
matplotlib.use("Qt5Agg")
from matplotlib.figure import Figure
from matplotlib.animation import TimedAnimation
from matplotlib.lines import Line2D
from matplotlib.backends.backend_qt5agg import FigureCanvasQTAgg as FigureCanvas
import time
import threading

class CustomMainWindow(QMainWindow):
    def __init__(self):
        super(CustomMainWindow, self).__init__()
        # Define the geometry of the main window
        self.setGeometry(300, 300, 800, 400)
        self.setWindowTitle("my first window")
        # Create FRAME_A
        self.FRAME_A = QFrame(self)
        self.FRAME_A.setStyleSheet("QWidget { background-color: %s }" % QColor(210,210,235,255).name())
        self.LAYOUT_A = QGridLayout()
        self.FRAME_A.setLayout(self.LAYOUT_A)
        self.setCentralWidget(self.FRAME_A)
        # Place the zoom button
        self.zoomBtn = QPushButton(text = 'zoom')
        self.zoomBtn.setFixedSize(100, 50)
        self.zoomBtn.clicked.connect(self.zoomBtnAction)
        self.LAYOUT_A.addWidget(self.zoomBtn, *(0,0))
        # Place the matplotlib figure
        self.myFig = CustomFigCanvas()
        self.LAYOUT_A.addWidget(self.myFig, *(0,1))
        # Add the callbackfunc to ..
        myDataLoop = threading.Thread(name = 'myDataLoop', target = dataSendLoop, daemon = True, args = (self.addData_callbackFunc,))
        myDataLoop.start()
        self.show()
        return

    def zoomBtnAction(self):
        print("zoom in")
        self.myFig.zoomIn(5)
        return

    def addData_callbackFunc(self, value):
        # print("Add data: " + str(value))
        self.myFig.addData(value)
        return

''' End Class '''


class CustomFigCanvas(FigureCanvas, TimedAnimation):
    def __init__(self):
        self.addedData = []
        print(matplotlib.__version__)
        # The data
        self.xlim = 200
        self.n = np.linspace(0, self.xlim - 1, self.xlim)
        a = []
        b = []
        a.append(2.0)
        a.append(4.0)
        a.append(2.0)
        b.append(4.0)
        b.append(3.0)
        b.append(4.0)
        self.y = (self.n * 0.0) + 50
        # The window
        self.fig = Figure(figsize=(5,5), dpi=100)
        self.ax1 = self.fig.add_subplot(111)
        # self.ax1 settings
        self.ax1.set_xlabel('time')
        self.ax1.set_ylabel('raw data')
        self.line1 = Line2D([], [], color='blue')
        self.line1_tail = Line2D([], [], color='red', linewidth=2)
        self.line1_head = Line2D([], [], color='red', marker='o', markeredgecolor='r')
        self.ax1.add_line(self.line1)
        self.ax1.add_line(self.line1_tail)
        self.ax1.add_line(self.line1_head)
        self.ax1.set_xlim(0, self.xlim - 1)
        self.ax1.set_ylim(0, 100)
        FigureCanvas.__init__(self, self.fig)
        TimedAnimation.__init__(self, self.fig, interval = 50, blit = True)
        return

    def new_frame_seq(self):
        return iter(range(self.n.size))

    def _init_draw(self):
        lines = [self.line1, self.line1_tail, self.line1_head]
        for l in lines:
            l.set_data([], [])
        return

    def addData(self, value):
        self.addedData.append(value)
        return

    def zoomIn(self, value):
        bottom = self.ax1.get_ylim()[0]
        top = self.ax1.get_ylim()[1]
        bottom += value
        top -= value
        self.ax1.set_ylim(bottom,top)
        self.draw()
        return

    def _step(self, *args):
        # Extends the _step() method for the TimedAnimation class.
        try:
            TimedAnimation._step(self, *args)
        except Exception as e:
            self.abc += 1
            print(str(self.abc))
            TimedAnimation._stop(self)
            pass
        return

    def _draw_frame(self, framedata):
        margin = 2
        while(len(self.addedData) > 0):
            self.y = np.roll(self.y, -1)
            self.y[-1] = self.addedData[0]
            del(self.addedData[0])

        self.line1.set_data(self.n[ 0 : self.n.size - margin ], self.y[ 0 : self.n.size - margin ])
        self.line1_tail.set_data(np.append(self.n[-10:-1 - margin], self.n[-1 - margin]), np.append(self.y[-10:-1 - margin], self.y[-1 - margin]))
        self.line1_head.set_data(self.n[-1 - margin], self.y[-1 - margin])
        self._drawn_artists = [self.line1, self.line1_tail, self.line1_head]
        return

''' End Class '''


# You need to setup a signal slot mechanism, to
# send data to your GUI in a thread-safe way.
# Believe me, if you don't do this right, things
# go very very wrong..
class Communicate(QObject):
    data_signal = pyqtSignal(float)

''' End Class '''



def dataSendLoop(addData_callbackFunc):
    # Setup the signal-slot mechanism.
    mySrc = Communicate()
    mySrc.data_signal.connect(addData_callbackFunc)

    # Simulate some data
    n = np.linspace(0, 499, 500)
    y = 50 + 25*(np.sin(n / 8.3)) + 10*(np.sin(n / 7.5)) - 5*(np.sin(n / 1.5))
    i = 0

    while(True):
        if(i > 499):
            i = 0
        time.sleep(0.1)
        mySrc.data_signal.emit(y[i]) # <- Here you emit a signal!
        i += 1
    ###
###

if __name__== '__main__':
    app = QApplication(sys.argv)
    QApplication.setStyle(QStyleFactory.create('Plastique'))
    myGUI = CustomMainWindow()
    sys.exit(app.exec_())

Just try it out. Copy-paste this code in a new python-file, and run it. You should get a beautiful, smoothly moving graph:

Headcloth

I noticed that the dataSendLoop thread kept running in the background when you close the window. So I added the daemon = True keyword to solve that issue. – Headcloth

The virtual environment for this took a bit of work. Finally, conda install pyqt=4 did the trick. – Borden

Thanks a lot for the basic code. It helped me to build up some simple UI by modifying and adding features around based on your code. It saved my time = ] – Nihon

Hi @IsaacSim, thank you very much for your kind message. I'm happy this code was helpful :-) – Headcloth

So i've taken this script and added timestamps to the x-axis by modifying the signal slot mechanism to use a np.ndarry type and emitting a np.array of the relative timestamp and signal. I'm updating the xlim() on each frame draw which does fine for displaying the signal with the new axis but not the x-labels/ticks only briefly update when I change the window size. @Headcloth I'm basically after a sliding xtick axis like the data is and was wondering if you had any success on something like this? – Fain

Nvm, I found a pseudo fix just by calling the resize_event(). – Fain

@Fain Can you explain how you updated the xlim() on each frame? Can you please provide some code example? @ K.Mulier Can you please provide a screenshot of your QtDesigner GUI? It would be much appreciated! – Wavelet

Hi @Dipok. I've never used QtDesigner, my aplogies. – Headcloth

As a slightly more official alternative, you can also use PyQtGraph, which is built on top of the officially supported Python binding for Qt, PySide6. – Dyadic

@DavidCian, There is no better alternative that a post with working code – Bijection

@Bijection Cool, here it is, from my own use case. If working code was always good code, software engineering wouldn't be a thing ;). As it turns out, in fact, PyQtGraph objectively is better, as it is designed for online plotting from the get-go, very much unlike Matplotlib. – Dyadic

Answer 4

The top (and many other) answers were built upon plt.pause(), but that was an old way of animating the plot in matplotlib. It is not only slow, but also causes focus to be grabbed upon each update (I had a hard time stopping the plotting python process).

TL;DR: you may want to use matplotlib.animation (as mentioned in documentation).

After digging around various answers and pieces of code, this in fact proved to be a smooth way of drawing incoming data infinitely for me.

Here is my code for a quick start. It plots current time with a random number in [0, 100) every 200ms infinitely, while also handling auto rescaling of the view:

from datetime import datetime
from matplotlib import pyplot
from matplotlib.animation import FuncAnimation
from random import randrange

x_data, y_data = [], []

figure = pyplot.figure()
line, = pyplot.plot_date(x_data, y_data, '-')

def update(frame):
    x_data.append(datetime.now())
    y_data.append(randrange(0, 100))
    line.set_data(x_data, y_data)
    figure.gca().relim()
    figure.gca().autoscale_view()
    return line,

animation = FuncAnimation(figure, update, interval=200)

pyplot.show()

You can also explore blit for even better performance as in FuncAnimation documentation.

An example from the blit documentation:

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from matplotlib.animation import FuncAnimation

fig, ax = plt.subplots()
xdata, ydata = [], []
ln, = plt.plot([], [], 'ro')

def init():
    ax.set_xlim(0, 2*np.pi)
    ax.set_ylim(-1, 1)
    return ln,

def update(frame):
    xdata.append(frame)
    ydata.append(np.sin(frame))
    ln.set_data(xdata, ydata)
    return ln,

ani = FuncAnimation(fig, update, frames=np.linspace(0, 2*np.pi, 128),
                    init_func=init, blit=True)
plt.show()

Hypotrachelium

Hi, what will happen if this was all in a loop. say for i in range(1000): x,y = some func_func(). Here some_func() generates online x,y data pairs, which I would like to plot once they are available. Is it possible to do this with FuncAnimation. My goal is to build the curve defined by the data step by step with each iteration. – Beatriz

@Alexander Cska pyploy.show() should block. If you want to append data, retrieve them and update in the update function. – Hypotrachelium

I fear that i don't really understand your reply. Would you amplify your suggestion please. – Beatriz

I mean, if you call pyplot.show in a loop, the loop will be blocked by this call and will not continue. If you want to append data to the curve step by step, put your logic in update, which will be called every interval so it's also step-by-step. – Hypotrachelium

Zhang's code works from the console but not in jupyter. I just get a blank plot there. In fact, when i populate an array in jupyter in a sequential loop and print the array as it grows with a pet.plot statement, I can get a print out of the arrays individually but only one plot. see this code: gist.github.com/bwanaaa/12252cf36b35fced0eb3c2f64a76cb8a – Toothpaste

can it plot multiple data in the graph? – Haunted

The return line' statement in the update() function doesn't seem to be needed. – Wellfixed

does a segmentation fault when ran – Veloz

Answer 5

None of the methods worked for me. But I have found this Real time matplotlib plot is not working while still in a loop

All you need is to add

plt.pause(0.0001)

and then you could see the new plots.

So your code should look like this, and it will work

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
plt.ion() ## Note this correction
fig=plt.figure()
plt.axis([0,1000,0,1])

i=0
x=list()
y=list()

while i <1000:
    temp_y=np.random.random();
    x.append(i);
    y.append(temp_y);
    plt.scatter(i,temp_y);
    i+=1;
    plt.show()
    plt.pause(0.0001) #Note this correction

Winifredwinikka

This opens a new figure / plot window every time for me is there a way to just update the existing figure ? maybe its becuase I am using imshow ? – Eyestalk

@FranciscoVargas if you are using imshow, you need to use set_data, look here: #17835802 – Winifredwinikka

Answer 6

show is probably not the best choice for this. What I would do is use pyplot.draw() instead. You also might want to include a small time delay (e.g., time.sleep(0.05)) in the loop so that you can see the plots happening. If I make these changes to your example it works for me and I see each point appearing one at a time.

Crevasse

I have very similar part of code, and when I try your solution (draw instead of show and time delay) python does not open a figure window at all, just goes throught the loop... – Staal

Answer 7

I know this question is old, but there's now a package available called drawnow on GitHub as "python-drawnow". This provides an interface similar to MATLAB's drawnow -- you can easily update a figure.

An example for your use case:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from drawnow import drawnow

def make_fig():
    plt.scatter(x, y)  # I think you meant this

plt.ion()  # enable interactivity
fig = plt.figure()  # make a figure

x = list()
y = list()

for i in range(1000):
    temp_y = np.random.random()
    x.append(i)
    y.append(temp_y)  # or any arbitrary update to your figure's data
    i += 1
    drawnow(make_fig)

python-drawnow is a thin wrapper around plt.draw but provides the ability to confirm (or debug) after figure display.

Abranchiate

This makes tk hang somewhere – Arabian

If so, file an issue with more context github.com/scottsievert/python-drawnow/issues – Abranchiate

+1 This worked for me for plotting live data per frame of video capture from opencv, while matplotlib froze. – Fasciculus

I tried this and it seemed slower than other methods. – Fishman

dont use, my server reboot, matplotlib frozen – Macon

not work it create a lot of figures – Clavichord

Answer 8

Another option is to go with bokeh. IMO, it is a good alternative at least for real-time plots. Here is a bokeh version of the code in the question:

from bokeh.plotting import curdoc, figure
import random
import time

def update():
    global i
    temp_y = random.random()
    r.data_source.stream({'x': [i], 'y': [temp_y]})
    i += 1

i = 0
p = figure()
r = p.circle([], [])
curdoc().add_root(p)
curdoc().add_periodic_callback(update, 100)

and for running it:

pip3 install bokeh
bokeh serve --show test.py

bokeh shows the result in a web browser via websocket communications. It is especially useful when data is generated by remote headless server processes.

Fluvial

Yes @samisnotinsane, but needs some modifications. Please refer to the documentations of push_notebook() and related tutorials. – Fluvial

Answer 9

Here is a version that I got to work on my system.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from drawnow import drawnow
import numpy as np

def makeFig():
    plt.scatter(xList,yList) # I think you meant this

plt.ion() # enable interactivity
fig=plt.figure() # make a figure

xList=list()
yList=list()

for i in np.arange(50):
    y=np.random.random()
    xList.append(i)
    yList.append(y)
    drawnow(makeFig)
    #makeFig()      The drawnow(makeFig) command can be replaced
    #plt.draw()     with makeFig(); plt.draw()
    plt.pause(0.001)

The drawnow(makeFig) line can be replaced with a makeFig(); plt.draw() sequence and it still works OK.

Bohemia

How do you know how long to pause? It appears to depend on the plot itself. – Holdfast

not work it create a lot of figures – Clavichord

Answer 10

An example use-case to plot CPU usage in real-time.

import time
import psutil
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

fig = plt.figure()
ax = fig.add_subplot(111)

i = 0
x, y = [], []

while True:
    x.append(i)
    y.append(psutil.cpu_percent())

    ax.plot(x, y, color='b')

    fig.canvas.draw()

    ax.set_xlim(left=max(0, i - 50), right=i + 50)
    fig.show()
    plt.pause(0.05)
    i += 1

Barrada

It really starts to slow down after about 2 minutes. What could the reason be? Perhaps earlier points, which fall outside the current view, should be dropped. – Stockdale

This looks really nice, but there are a couple of problems with it: 1. it's impossible to quit 2. after just a few minutes the program consumes nearly 100 Mb of RAM and starts slowing down dramatically. – Stockdale

The reason for the issues in the comments is that the algorithm append the new values without removing the old ones (although it shows only the last 50 steps). It is better to use a queue withmax size to remove old values from the beginning of the array if it excceds the plot limitations (using pop(0) for both x and y) – Yenyenisei

Answer 11

The problem seems to be that you expect plt.show() to show the window and then to return. It does not do that. The program will stop at that point and only resume once you close the window. You should be able to test that: If you close the window and then another window should pop up.

To resolve that problem just call plt.show() once after your loop. Then you get the complete plot. (But not a 'real-time plotting')

You can try setting the keyword-argument block like this: plt.show(block=False) once at the beginning and then use .draw() to update.

Francoise

real-time plotting is really what I'm going for. I'm going to be running a 5 hour test on something and want to see how things are progressing. – Precedency

@Precedency were you able to conduct the 5 hour test? I am also looking for something similar. I am using plyplot.pause(time_duration) to update the plot. Is there any other way to do so? – Polaroid

Answer 12

If you want draw and not freeze your thread as more point are drawn you should use plt.pause() not time.sleep()

im using the following code to plot a series of xy coordinates.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt 
import math


pi = 3.14159

fig, ax = plt.subplots()

x = []
y = []

def PointsInCircum(r,n=20):
    circle = [(math.cos(2*pi/n*x)*r,math.sin(2*pi/n*x)*r) for x in xrange(0,n+1)]
    return circle

circle_list = PointsInCircum(3, 50)

for t in range(len(circle_list)):
    if t == 0:
        points, = ax.plot(x, y, marker='o', linestyle='--')
        ax.set_xlim(-4, 4) 
        ax.set_ylim(-4, 4) 
    else:
        x_coord, y_coord = circle_list.pop()
        x.append(x_coord)
        y.append(y_coord)
        points.set_data(x, y)
    plt.pause(0.01)

Sake

Answer 13

This is the right way to plot Dynamic real-time matplot plots animation using while loop

There is a medium article on that too:

pip install celluloid # this will capture the image/animation

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
from celluloid import Camera # getting the camera
import matplotlib.animation as animation
from IPython import display
import time
from IPython.display import HTML

import warnings
%matplotlib notebook
warnings.filterwarnings('ignore')
warnings.simplefilter('ignore')

fig = plt.figure() #Empty fig object
ax = fig.add_subplot() #Empty axis object
camera = Camera(fig) # Camera object to capture the snap

def f(x):
    ''' function to create a sine wave'''
    return np.sin(x) + np.random.normal(scale=0.1, size=len(x))

l = []

while True:
    value = np.random.randint(9) #random number generator
    l.append(value) # appneds each time number is generated
    X = np.linspace(10, len(l)) # creates a line space for x axis, Equal to the length of l

    for i in range(10): #plots 10 such lines
        plt.plot(X, f(X))

    fig.show() #shows the figure object
    fig.canvas.draw() 
    camera.snap() # camera object to capture teh animation
    time.sleep(1)

And for saving etc:

animation = camera.animate(interval = 200, repeat = True, repeat_delay = 500)
HTML(animation.to_html5_video())
animation.save('abc.mp4') # to save 

output is:

Rozamond

Answer 14

Live plot with circular buffer with line style retained:

import os
import time
import psutil
import collections

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

pts_n = 100
x = collections.deque(maxlen=pts_n)
y = collections.deque(maxlen=pts_n)
(line, ) = plt.plot(x, y, linestyle="--")

my_process = psutil.Process(os.getpid())
t_start = time.time()
while True:
    x.append(time.time() - t_start)
    y.append(my_process.cpu_percent())

    line.set_xdata(x)
    line.set_ydata(y)
    plt.gca().relim()
    plt.gca().autoscale_view()
    plt.pause(0.1)

Meetinghouse

not work. its add a lot of figures – Clavichord

I tested above to work with Ubuntu 20.04.4, Python 3.8.10, matplotlib==3.1.2. – Meetinghouse

I tested it in vscode and in google colab, but not work 😢 – Clavichord

Answer 15

I created this code with a slightly different point of view:

import numpy as np
from matplotlib import pyplot


figure = pyplot.figure()
# get current axes  # If figure.axes == [], a new one is created
axes = figure.gca()
axes.axis([0, 1000, 0, 1])
figure.show()

x_val, x_values, y_values = 0, list(), list()
while x_val < 1000:
    if not pyplot.fignum_exists(figure.number):
        break  # break when window is closed
    y_val = np.random.random()
    x_values.append(x_val)
    y_values.append(y_val)
    axes.scatter(x_val, y_val)
    x_val += 1
    figure.canvas.draw()
    figure.canvas.flush_events()

Build