Moving the legend

Let's wrap up this course by making a publication-ready plot communicating a clear message.

To change stylistic elements of a plot, call theme() and set plot properties to a new value. For example, the following changes the legend position.

p + theme(legend.position = new_value)

Here, the new value can be

  • "top", "bottom", "left", or "right'": place it at that side of the plot.
  • "none": don't draw it.
  • c(x, y): c(0, 0) means the bottom-left and c(1, 1) means the top-right.

Let's revisit the recession period line plot (assigned to plt_prop_unemployed_over_time).

This exercise is part of the course

Introduction to Data Visualization with ggplot2

View Course

Hands-on interactive exercise

Have a go at this exercise by completing this sample code.

# View the default plot
plt_prop_unemployed_over_time

# Remove legend entirely
plt_prop_unemployed_over_time +
  ___