theme_bw ggplot2 Theme in R (6 Examples)

In this article you’ll learn how to change the ggplot2 theme to the theme_bw in the R programming language.

Table of contents:

Here’s how to do it!

Example Data & Add-On Packages

Have a look at the following example data.

set.seed(926853)                           # Set random seed
data <- data.frame(x = rnorm(100),         # Create example data frame
                   y = rnorm(100),
                   group = LETTERS[1:4])
head(data)                                 # Print head of example data frame

Have a look at the previous table. It shows the first six rows of our exemplifying data, and that our data has three columns. The variables x and y have the numeric data type and the variable group is a character.

To be able to plot our data using the ggplot2 package, we also need to install and load ggplot2:

install.packages("ggplot2")                # Install & load ggplot2
library("ggplot2")

Now, we can draw different types of plots using the theme_bw theme style by applying the theme_bw() function as shown in the following examples.

Example 1: Draw ggplot2 Scatterplot Using theme_bw()

ggplot(data,                               # theme_bw scatterplot
       aes(x = x,
           y = y,
           col = group)) +
  geom_point() +
  theme_bw()

Example 2: Draw ggplot2 Density Plot Using theme_bw()

ggplot(data,                               # theme_bw density plot
       aes(x = x,
           fill = group)) +
  geom_density(alpha = 0.5) +
  theme_bw()

Example 3: Draw ggplot2 Histogram Using theme_bw()

ggplot(data,                               # theme_bw histogram
       aes(x = x,
           fill = group)) +
  geom_histogram(alpha = 0.5,
                 position = "identity",
                 bins = 50) +
  theme_bw()

Example 4: Draw ggplot2 Barchart Using theme_bw()

ggplot(aggregate(y ~ group, data, sum),    # theme_bw barplot
       aes(x = group,
           y = y,
           fill = group)) +
  geom_bar(stat = "identity") +
  theme_bw()

Example 5: Draw ggplot2 Boxplot Using theme_bw()

ggplot(data,                               # theme_bw boxplot
       aes(x = x,
           fill = group)) +
  geom_boxplot() +
  theme_bw()

Example 6: Draw ggplot2 Line Plot Using theme_bw()

ggplot(data,                               # theme_bw line plot
       aes(x = x,
           y = y,
           col = group)) +
  geom_line() +
  theme_bw()

Video & Further Resources

Would you like to know more about the ggplot2 package? Then you may have a look at the following video of my YouTube channel. I explain how to use the ggplot2 package in much more detail:

On Statistics Globe, you can also find tutorials on how to plot different kinds of graphics such as xy-plots, density plots, barcharts, boxplots, histograms, and line plots using other ggplot2 themes:

• theme_classic
• theme_dark
• theme_economist [ggthemes Package]
• theme_gray
• theme_light
• theme_linedraw
• theme_minimal
• theme_test
• theme_void

Also, you can have a look at the introductions to other add-on packages that provide extra themes for ggplot2 plots:

• ggthemes Package in R
• ggthemr Package in R

Furthermore, you might have a look at the related tutorials on my homepage. A selection of tutorials is listed below:

• ggplot2 Themes in R
• R Graphics Gallery
• All R Programming Examples

To summarize: At this point you should have learned how to transform the ggplot2 theme to the theme_bw in R programming. If you have further questions, let me know in the comments.