Rendering math equations using TeX

You can use TeX to render all of your Matplotlib text by setting rcParams["text.usetex"] (default: False) to True. This requires that you have TeX and the other dependencies described in the Text rendering with LaTeX tutorial properly installed on your system. Matplotlib caches processed TeX expressions, so that only the first occurrence of an expression triggers a TeX compilation. Later occurrences reuse the rendered image from the cache and are thus faster.

Unicode input is supported, e.g. for the y-axis label in this example.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np

plt.rcParams['text.usetex'] = True


t = np.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 100)
s = np.cos(4 * np.pi * t) + 2

fig, ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(6, 4), tight_layout=True)
ax.plot(t, s)

ax.set_xlabel(r'\textbf{time (s)}')
ax.set_ylabel('\\textit{Velocity (\N{DEGREE SIGN}/sec)}', fontsize=16)
ax.set_title(r'\TeX\ is Number $\displaystyle\sum_{n=1}^\infty'
             r'\frac{-e^{i\pi}}{2^n}$!', fontsize=16, color='r')

A more complex example.

fig, ax = plt.subplots()
# interface tracking profiles
N = 500
delta = 0.6
X = np.linspace(-1, 1, N)
ax.plot(X, (1 - np.tanh(4 * X / delta)) / 2,    # phase field tanh profiles
        X, (1.4 + np.tanh(4 * X / delta)) / 4, "C2",  # composition profile
        X, X < 0, "k--")                        # sharp interface

# legend
ax.legend(("phase field", "level set", "sharp interface"),
          shadow=True, loc=(0.01, 0.48), handlelength=1.5, fontsize=16)

# the arrow
ax.annotate("", xy=(-delta / 2., 0.1), xytext=(delta / 2., 0.1),
            arrowprops=dict(arrowstyle="<->", connectionstyle="arc3"))
ax.text(0, 0.1, r"$\delta$",
        color="black", fontsize=24,
        horizontalalignment="center", verticalalignment="center",
        bbox=dict(boxstyle="round", fc="white", ec="black", pad=0.2))

# Use tex in labels
ax.set_xticks([-1, 0, 1])
ax.set_xticklabels(["$-1$", r"$\pm 0$", "$+1$"], color="k", size=20)

# Left Y-axis labels, combine math mode and text mode
ax.set_ylabel(r"\bf{phase field} $\phi$", color="C0", fontsize=20)
ax.set_yticks([0, 0.5, 1])
ax.set_yticklabels([r"\bf{0}", r"\bf{.5}", r"\bf{1}"], color="k", size=20)

# Right Y-axis labels
ax.text(1.02, 0.5, r"\bf{level set} $\phi$",
        color="C2", fontsize=20, rotation=90,
        horizontalalignment="left", verticalalignment="center",
        clip_on=False, transform=ax.transAxes)

# Use multiline environment inside a `text`.
# level set equations
eq1 = (r"\begin{eqnarray*}"
       r"|\nabla\phi| &=& 1,\\"
       r"\frac{\partial \phi}{\partial t} + U|\nabla \phi| &=& 0 "
       r"\end{eqnarray*}")
ax.text(1, 0.9, eq1, color="C2", fontsize=18,
        horizontalalignment="right", verticalalignment="top")

# phase field equations
eq2 = (r"\begin{eqnarray*}"
       r"\mathcal{F} &=& \int f\left( \phi, c \right) dV, \\ "
       r"\frac{ \partial \phi } { \partial t } &=& -M_{ \phi } "
       r"\frac{ \delta \mathcal{F} } { \delta \phi }"
       r"\end{eqnarray*}")
ax.text(0.18, 0.18, eq2, color="C0", fontsize=16)

ax.text(-1, .30, r"gamma: $\gamma$", color="r", fontsize=20)
ax.text(-1, .18, r"Omega: $\Omega$", color="b", fontsize=20)

plt.show()