Matplotlib.patches.ArrowStyle class in Python

Last Updated : 27 Apr, 2020

Matplotlib is an amazing visualization library in Python for 2D plots of arrays. Matplotlib is a multi-platform data visualization library built on NumPy arrays and designed to work with the broader SciPy stack.

matplotlib.patches.ArrowStyle

The matplotlib.patches.ArrowStyle class is a container class that defines many arrowstyle classes, that are used to make an arrow path along a provided path. These are primarily used with FancyArrowpatch.

Syntax: class matplotlib.patches.ArrowStyle

The below subclasses are defined for various arrowstyle;

Class	Name	Attributes
Curve	-	None
CurveB	->	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.2
BracketB	-[	widthB=1.0, lengthB=0.2, angleB=None
CurveFilledB	-\|>	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.2
CurveA	<-	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.2
CurveAB	<-\|>	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.2
CurveFilledA	<\|-	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.2
CurveFilledAB	<\|-\|>	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.2
BracketA	]-	widthA=1.0, lengthA=0.2, angleA=None
BracketAB	]-[	widthA=1.0, lengthA=0.2, angleA=None, widthB=1.0, lengthB=0.2, angleB=None
Fancy	fancy	head_length=0.4, head_width=0.4, tail_width=0.4
Simple	simple	head_length=0.5, head_width=0.5, tail_width=0.2
Wedge	wedge	tail_width=0.3, shrink_factor=0.5
BarAB	\|-\|	widthA=1.0, angleA=None, widthB=1.0, angleB=None

Example 1:

Python3 1==

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from matplotlib.patches import ArrowStyle

plt.figure(1, figsize =(9, 9))

ArrowStyle("Wedge")

ax = plt.subplot(111)

ax.annotate("",
            xy =(0.2, 0.2), xycoords ='data',
            xytext =(0.8, 0.8), textcoords ='data',
            arrowprops = dict(arrowstyle ="Wedge",
                            connectionstyle ="arc3"), 
            )

plt.show()

Output:

Example 2:

Python3 1==

import matplotlib.patches as mpatch
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt


figheight = 8
fig = plt.figure(figsize =(9, figheight), dpi = 80)
fontsize = 0.4 * fig.dpi

def make_boxstyles(ax):
    styles = mpatch.BoxStyle.get_styles()

    for i, (stylename, styleclass) in enumerate(sorted(styles.items())):
        ax.text(0.5, 
                (float(len(styles)) - 0.5 - i)/len(styles),
                stylename,
                ha ="center",
                size = fontsize,
                transform = ax.transAxes,
                bbox = dict(boxstyle = stylename, 
                            fc ="g", ec ="r"))

def make_arrowstyles(ax):
    styles = mpatch.ArrowStyle.get_styles()

    ax.set_xlim(0, 4)
    ax.set_ylim(0, figheight)

    for i, (stylename, styleclass) in enumerate(sorted(styles.items())):
        
        # /figheight
        y = (float(len(styles)) - 0.25 - i
        p = mpatch.Circle((3.2, y), 0.2, fc ="r")
        ax.add_patch(p)

        ax.annotate(stylename, (3.2, y),
                    (2., y),
                    
                    # xycoords ="figure fraction",
                    # textcoords ="figure fraction",
                    ha ="right", va ="center",
                    size = fontsize,
                    arrowprops = dict(arrowstyle = stylename,
                                    patchB = p,
                                    shrinkA = 5,
                                    shrinkB = 5,
                                    fc ="w", ec ="r",
                                    connectionstyle ="arc3, rad =-0.05",
                                    ),
                    bbox = dict(boxstyle ="square", fc ="g"))

    ax.xaxis.set_visible(False)
    ax.yaxis.set_visible(False)


ax1 = fig.add_subplot(121, frameon = False, xticks =[], yticks =[])
make_boxstyles(ax1)

ax2 = fig.add_subplot(122, frameon = False, xticks =[], yticks =[])
make_arrowstyles(ax2)


plt.show()