How do I change the background color of a plot made with ggplot2

Question

By default  ggplot2 produces plots with a grey background   How do I change the color of the background of the plot   For example  a plot produced by the following code   library ggplot2  myplot lt -ggplot data data frame a c 1 2 3   b c 2 3 4    aes x a  y b     geom line   myplot

User · Answer

Here s a custom theme to make the ggplot2 background white and a bunch of other changes that s good for publications and posters  Just tack on  mytheme  If you want to add or change options by  theme after  mytheme  it will just replace those options from  mytheme   library ggplot2  library cowplot  theme set theme cowplot     mytheme   list      theme classic            theme panel background   element blank   strip background   element rect colour NA  fill NA  panel border   element rect fill   NA  color    black                  legend title   element blank   legend position  bottom   strip text   element text face  bold   size 9                 axis text element text face  bold   axis title   element text face  bold   plot title   element text face    bold   hjust   0 5 size 13      ggplot data data frame a c 1 2 3   b c 2 3 4    aes x a  y b     mytheme   geom line

User · Answer

To avoid deprecated opts and theme rect use   myplot   theme panel background   element rect fill  green   colour  red      To define your own custom theme  based on theme gray but with some of your changes and a few added extras including control of gridline colour size  more options available to play with at ggplot2 org    theme jack  lt - function  base size   12  base family             theme gray base size   base size  base family   base family    replace           theme              axis text   element text colour    white                axis title x   element text colour    pink   size rel 3                axis title y   element text colour    blue   angle 45               panel background   element rect fill  green                panel grid minor y   element line size 3               panel grid major   element line colour    orange                plot background   element rect fill  red                To make your custom theme the default when ggplot is called in future  without masking   theme set theme jack      If you want to change an element of the currently set theme   theme update plot background   element rect fill  pink    axis title x   element text colour    red      To store the current default theme as an object   theme pink  lt - theme get     Note that theme pink is a list whereas theme jack was a function  So to return the theme to theme jack use theme set theme jack    whereas to return to theme pink use theme set theme pink    You can replace theme gray by theme bw in the definition of theme jack if you prefer  For your custom theme to resemble theme bw but with all gridlines  x  y  major and minor  turned off   theme nogrid  lt - function  base size   12  base family             theme bw base size   base size  base family   base family    replace           theme              panel grid   element blank                Finally a more radical theme useful when plotting choropleths or other maps in ggplot  based on discussion here but updated to avoid deprecation  The aim here is to remove the gray background  and any other features that might distract from the map   theme map  lt - function  base size   12  base family             theme gray base size   base size  base family   base family    replace           theme              axis line element blank                axis text x element blank                axis text y element blank                axis ticks element blank                axis ticks length unit 0 3   lines                axis ticks margin unit 0 5   lines                axis title x element blank                axis title y element blank                legend background element rect fill  white   colour NA               legend key element rect colour  white                legend key size unit 1 2   lines                legend position  right               legend text element text size rel 0 8                legend title element text size rel 0 8   face  bold   hjust 0               panel background element blank                panel border element blank                panel grid major element blank                panel grid minor element blank                panel margin unit 0   lines                plot background element blank                plot margin unit c 1  1  0 5  0 5    lines                plot title element text size rel 1 2                strip background element rect fill  grey90   colour  grey50                strip text x element text size rel 0 8                strip text y element text size rel 0 8   angle -90

User · Answer

To change the panel s background color  use the following code   myplot   theme panel background   element rect fill    green   colour    red      To change the color of the plot  but not the color of the panel   you can do   myplot   theme plot background   element rect fill    green   colour    red      See here for more theme details Quick reference sheet for legends  axes and themes

[r] How do I change the background color of a plot made with ggplot2

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