Disable cowplot default for ggplots

Question

The ggplot2 add-on package, cowplot, has a nice function for plotting multiple plots called plot_grid(). Here's plot_grid() in action:

library(ggplot2); library(cowplot)

plot_a <- ggplot(mtcars, aes(mpg, wt)) + geom_point()
plot_b <- ggplot(mtcars, aes(mpg, disp)) + geom_point()

plot_grid(plot_a, plot_b, labels = c("A", "B"))

But note how loading cowplot changes the default style of plots. How can I load the cowplot package so that I can use the plot_grid() function but also disable the default plot styles that cowplot enforces?

could you not load `cowplot` and then just use `cowplot::plot_grid()`? — chandler, Feb 02 '17 at 10:28
No -- as soon as you call `library(cowplot)`, ggplot's behavior changes. — eric_kernfeld, Jan 31 '18 at 17:50
As of version 1.0 cowplot no longer sets the default theme. https://wilkelab.org/cowplot/articles/introduction.html — pbaylis, Feb 28 '20 at 19:57

JasonAizkalns · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-30T14:43:35.587

11

Just call theme_set(theme_gray()) beforehand:

theme_set(theme_gray())
plot_grid(plot_a, plot_b, labels = c("A", "B"))

Then, if you want to go crazy with themes, you could install ggthemes and simply replace theme_gray() with any theme you choose, or roll your own. Also see this vignette for styling individual elements.

edited Oct 30 '15 at 14:43

answered Oct 30 '15 at 14:37

JasonAizkalns

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score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 04 '18 at 15:25

As mentioned in the comments, once you've installed the cowplot package you can load the plot_grid() function with the :: operator (see What are the double colons (::) in R?) and cowplot won't change any ggplot2 defaults.

> plot_a <- ggplot(mtcars, aes(mpg, wt)) + geom_point()
> plot_b <- ggplot(mtcars, aes(mpg, disp)) + geom_point()
> plot_grid(plot_a, plot_b, labels = c("A", "B"))
Error in plot_grid(plot_a, plot_b, labels = c("A", "B")) : 
  could not find function "plot_grid"

> cowplot::plot_grid(plot_a, plot_b, labels = c("A", "B"))

The issue comes when you load the entire cowplot package with library() or require().

Nice , this just saved my bacon. This is a better answer than the accepted one, as it avoids the issue of overriding defaults entirely, rather than trying to override the override... — Michael MacAskill, Jun 08 '19 at 08:16

Disable cowplot default for ggplots

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