How can I change the tick values on x axis?

Hello everyone,

I would like to put the tick label on x axis every 2 years instead of every 5 years. How can I do it?

Thank you!

LD = load('MODESTAMMEQ.mat');
MODESTAMMEQ = LD.MODESTAMMEQ;
dv = regexp(MODESTAMMEQ.Jan1989, '\d*\-\w*\-\d*','match');
MODESTAMMEQ.Var1 = datetime([dv{:}], 'InputFormat',"dd-MMM-yyyy").';
x = MODESTAMMEQ.Var1;
y = MODESTAMMEQ.Var2*10*0.35;
figure
plot(x, y)
grid

Answer 1

[Peter Bonavita]

Hi Pul,

You can use xticks to specify the values where you want the ticks to appear, and xticklabels to customize the labels themselves, if you wish.

In your case, you'll specify something like xticks([0 5 10 15]), etc.

Thanks,

Peter

[Pul]

Hello Peter,

I tried in this way: xticks([0 2 4 6]) because I need every 2 years, but I got this error: Tick values must be a vector of increasing datetime values.

Thank you.

[Rik]

How is Matlab supposed to know those values should be interpreted as datetime values? The error message is the hint: you should create a vector of datetime values you want as tick locations.

[Peter Bonavita]

Hi Pul, this should get you started.

First, check out the value of xticks from your original plot:

>> ticks = xticks

ticks = 

  1×4 datetime array

   2000   2005   2010   2015

Create a datetime array as Rik suggested:

newTicks = datetime({'2000','2002','2004','2006'},'InputFormat','u');

Use this to update the labels on the plot with xticks:

>> xticks(newTicks)

[Pul]

Thank you @Peter Bonavita.

The only problem is that then I can't plot my y with the new x, because they have a different length.

newTicks = datetime({'2000','2002','2004','2006','2008','2010','2012','2014','2016','2018'},'InputFormat','u');
xticks(''2000','2002','2004','2006','2008','2010','2012','2014','2016','2018');