Skip to content

imshow

Display data as an image (a regular raster of pixels).

Matplotlib: Axes.imshow.

Axes: rectangular (ax).

When to use it

imshow expects a ready-made 2D (or RGB/RGBA) image array, so it is uncommon in the usual data-frame workflow. For scalar fields built from samples, prefer pcolormesh (regular grid, supports log axes) or jpfield (scattered input). Use imshow when you genuinely have image-like raster data.

Style

Key Type Purpose
cmap string Colormap
vmin / vmax float Color scale limits
origin string "upper" or "lower"
extent [x0, x1, y0, y1] Data coordinates of the image corners
aspect string/float "auto", "equal", or a ratio
interpolation string e.g. "nearest", "bilinear"

Any other Axes.imshow keyword is also accepted.


See also: Plot Methods index ยท pcolormesh