Streamgraph

logo of a chart:Stream

A streamgraph is a variation of the stacked area graph. It displays the evolution of a numeric value for several groups. Each group is displayed around a central axis and edges are rounded resulting in a flowing and organic shape.

Matplotlib logoStreamgraph with Matplotlib

Matplotlib can build streamgraphs but there isn't any prebuilt function for it so be ready for quite a lot of code. 🍿

The process starts pretty much like for a stacked area graph. The baseline parameter of the stackplot() function is used to place groups around the X axis. The tricky part is to interpolate points between each value of the X axis to get the smooth visual. This is done thanks to the scipy.interpolate library.

🔎 stackplot() function parameters→ see full doc

→ Description

The stackplot() function from matplotlib creates a stacked area plot. This type of plot is used to show how multiple variables change over time, with each variable stacked on top of the previous ones. It's particularly useful for visualizing the composition of a whole over time.

→ Arguments

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