Size of subplots in figure is not the same

I have attached a figure in which I want to plot 13 subplots.

I have used

subplot(5,3,n)

to do so.

For some reason, matlab makes plot n°8 smaller than all the other plots.

Does anyone know why this happens or what would the most straightforward way to fix this?

Thanks!

[DGM]

Note that the axes in the first column are also smaller. My guess is that something is momentarily drawn (e.g. ylabel or long ticklabels) which requires the axes geometry to be smaller, but said object is subsequently changed or removed. Without knowing how they are being plotted, I don't know.

[Inti Vanmechelen]

figure(1)
subplot(3,5,1);
boxplot(X)
yt = get(gca, 'YTick');
axis([xlim    0  ceil(max(yt)*1.2)])
xt = get(gca, 'XTick');
hold on
plot(xt([1 2]), [1 1]*max(yt)*1.1, '-k',  mean(xt([1 2])), max(yt)*1.15, '*k')
plot(xt([3 4]), [1 1]*max(yt)*1.1, '-k',  mean(xt([3 4])), max(yt)*1.15, '*k')
hold off
xticklabels({'DCP RF','TD RF','DCP RGV','TD RGV','DCP RS','TD RS'});
a = get(gca,'XTickLabel');  
set(gca,'XTickLabel',a,'fontsize',8)
ylabel('Standard deviation (°)','FontSize',11);
title('Elevation plane');

Sorry, here is the code for subplot 1!

[Ankit]

If you observed your figure carefully 1,6, 8 and so on are of same size and others are of different size

[DGM]

... and how does this code differ from what's used for the others?

[Inti Vanmechelen]

That is the odd thing, it does not... I have used the exact same code for all subplots.

[DGM]

Something must be different. The other plots don't have ylabels, and there's no title.

Without knowing what exactly happened, all I can say is to use the geometry of the neighboring axes to fix the errant one(s).

open BOXPLOTS.fig
hax = get(gcf,'children');

P0 = vertcat(hax.Position);
for k = 1:numel(hax)
	hax(k).Position(3:4) = P0(5,3:4);
end
P1 = vertcat(hax.Position);
for k = 1:numel(hax)
	hax(k).Position(1) = P0(k,1)-(P1(k,3)-P0(k,3));
end

That will just ignore the cause and simply resize all the axes to be the same size.

Answer 1

[Adam Danz]

The cause of the problem is difficult to troubleshoot without having a reproducible example. Here are two workarounds.

Set PositionConstraint

I think this should fix the problem but since we don't have a reproducible example, I can't be sure. Set the PositionConstraint of the axes to innerposition before applying axis labels etc. As explained in the documentation, this will keep the inner axis position constant when adding labels etc.

figure()
ax = subplot(3,5,1);  % <--------------------------use axis handles!
boxplot(ax, rand(5,6))
set(ax,'PositionConstraint','innerposition') % <---set PositionConstraint
hold(ax,'on') % <----------------------------------hold on
yt = get(ax, 'YTick');
axis([xlim    0  ceil(max(yt)*1.2)])
xt = get(ax, 'XTick');
% plot(ax, xt([1 2]), [1 1]*max(yt)*1.1, '-k',  mean(xt([1 2])), max(yt)*1.15, '*k')
% plot(ax, xt([3 4]), [1 1]*max(yt)*1.1, '-k',  mean(xt([3 4])), max(yt)*1.15, '*k')
hold(ax,'off')
xticklabels(ax,{'DCP RF','TD RF','DCP RGV','TD RGV','DCP RS','TD RS'});
% a = get(ax,'XTickLabel');  % <-----------------Redundant to the line above
% set(gca,'XTickLabel',a,'fontsize',8)
set(ax,'fontsize',8)
ylabel(ax,'Standard deviation (°)','FontSize',11);
title(ax,'Elevation plane');

Used TiledLayout

If you use TiledLayout instead of subplot, the axes position are better controlled.

figure()
tlo = tiledlayout(3,5);
ax = nexttile(tlo); 
boxplot(ax, rand(5,6))
% (...)
ax2 = nexttile(tlo); 
boxplot(ax2, rand(5,6))
% (...) etc....

[Inti Vanmechelen]

PositionConstraint gave me an error but the tiledlayout option did give me want I wanted.

Thanks a lot!

[Adam Danz]

If you're using a Matlab release prior to R2020a, then use ActivePositionProperty rather than PositionConstraint. Otherwise, if you share the error and would like to fix it, I can help. But it sounds like TiledLayout worked for you (in also controls the innerposition property).