Here is a simple template to create a horizontal bar chart using Matplotlib:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
y_axis = ["value_1", "value_2", "value_3", ...]
x_axis = ["value_1", "value_2", "value_3", ...]
plt.barh(y_axis, x_axis)
plt.title("title name")
plt.ylabel("y axis name")
plt.xlabel("x axis name")
plt.show()
Steps to Create Horizontal Bar Chart using Matplotlib
Step 1: Gather the data for the chart
For example, let’s use the data below to plot the chart:
| product | quantity |
| computer | 320 |
| monitor | 450 |
| laptop | 300 |
| printer | 120 |
| tablet | 280 |
Step 2: Plot the horizontal bar chart using Matplotlib
You can then plot the chart using this syntax:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
product = ["computer", "monitor", "laptop", "printer", "tablet"]
quantity = [320, 450, 300, 120, 280]
plt.barh(product, quantity)
plt.title("store inventory")
plt.ylabel("product")
plt.xlabel("quantity")
plt.show()
Run the code in Python, and you’ll see the ‘product‘ on the y_axis, and the ‘quantity‘ on the x_axis.
Step 3 (optional): Style the chart
You can further style the chart by including the following syntax:
plt.style.use("ggplot")So the complete code to style the chart:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
product = ["computer", "monitor", "laptop", "printer", "tablet"]
quantity = [320, 450, 300, 120, 280]
plt.style.use("ggplot")
plt.barh(product, quantity)
plt.title("store inventory")
plt.ylabel("product")
plt.xlabel("quantity")
plt.show()
Plot the Horizontal Bar Chart with the Help of Pandas
You can plot the same bar chart with the help of the Pandas library:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import pandas as pd
data = {"quantity": [320, 450, 300, 120, 280]}
df = pd.DataFrame(data, index=["computer", "monitor", "laptop", "printer", "tablet"])
df.plot.barh()
plt.title("store inventory")
plt.ylabel("product")
plt.xlabel("quantity")
plt.show()
Once you run the code, you’ll get the same bar chart.
Let’s say that you also want to capture the ‘price‘ (in addition to the ‘quantity’) associated with the product.
In that case, you can use the code below in order to create the horizontal bar chart with both the price and the quantity:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import pandas as pd
data = {"quantity": [320, 450, 300, 120, 280], "price": [800, 250, 1200, 150, 300]}
df = pd.DataFrame(data, index=["computer", "monitor", "laptop", "printer", "tablet"])
df.plot.barh()
plt.title("store inventory")
plt.ylabel("product")
plt.xlabel("quantity")
plt.show()
You can further style the chart using:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import pandas as pd
data = {"quantity": [320, 450, 300, 120, 280], "price": [800, 250, 1200, 150, 300]}
df = pd.DataFrame(data, index=["computer", "monitor", "laptop", "printer", "tablet"])
plt.style.use("ggplot")
df.plot.barh()
plt.title("store inventory")
plt.ylabel("product")
plt.xlabel("quantity")
plt.show()
You can learn more about plotting charts by visiting the Matplotlib Documentation.