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Insert Matlab Figure into Latex

Many user may would like to include high quality Matlab graphics in their Latex articles or books. Here I will share some tips how to do it. From easy to difficult, I will introduce three methods: 1. Export an .eps file from Maltab, and include it in Latex article. 2. Export an .eps file from Maltab, edit this file with Adobe Illustrator, then use it in Latex. 3. Produce a TikZ code from the Matlab figure, and then include the TikZ code in Latex.

Now I will detail introduce each method, at last will talk about each method advantage and disadvantage.

1.Export .eps file

This is the most easy way, just need save the figure in Matlab as an .eps file, and then include the .eps file in Latex.

Or with Matlab command:

saveas(gcf,'Plot1.eps', 'psc2')

Or it can use below command to print the figure to .eps file:

set(gcf, 'PaperPositionMode', 'auto');
print -depsc2 Plot1.eps

Then you can include the .eps file in Latex, for example:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{graphicx}
\begin{document}

\begin{figure}[h]
    \centerline{\includegraphics[width=8cm]{Plot1.eps}}
    \caption{This is Plot1}
\end{figure}

\end{document}

Although this method is very easy, but the texts or vibration characters font on the figure may not same as Latex. And the text size will depend on the export file size, and the figure size setting in Latex. It maybe very hard to control the characters size on figures comply with the article text size.

2. Edit .eps file in AI

As said above, the text on Matlab figure maybe not the same style as the text in Latex, and it hard to choose a suitable size for the final figure. But we can edit the .eps file with Adobe Illustrator before use it. Here I will introduce some tips about it.

  1. First, open the .eps file, and set the document size same as your document size in Latex. For example, if I will product a A4 paper article, then I set the size as A4.
  2. Scale the figure in AI, the size is what you wanted it would be in A4 paper.
  3. Set the text size as it real size. For example, the article text size is 12pt, while I want the text on figure is a little smaller than it, set it 10.5pt.
  4. Also you can edit the line style, color, weight, ect in AI. It’s very easy to edit any element in AI.
  5. After the picture is good, select all elements, then on the tool bar you will see the width and height of whole, please ref to below picture. Then save the .eps file. Now, you can use this value to set the figure size in latex.

figure size

By this way we can control the figure size and text size very well.

3. Export Matlab figure as TikZ code

You will find edit .eps file in AI will be very powerful to edit the figure, but if there are lots of pictures, it will need a lot of time. And AI is a commercial program. There is another way to produce a high quality pictures, by using TikZ.

If you are familiar with Latex, you should know TikZ. We can insert TikZ code in Latex document directly, and it will produce the pictures we need. But it need spend sometime to learn TikZ. More info and examples can be found here.

Here is a solution, that can export Matlab figure as TikZ code with matlab2tikz, download it here.

matlab2tikz supports the conversion of most MATLAB figures, including 2D and 3D plots. For plots constructed with third- party packages, your mileage may vary.

The workflow is as follows:

  1. Place the matlab2tikz scripts (contents of src/ folder) in a directory where MATLAB can find it (the current directory, for example).
  2. Generate your plot in MATLAB.

  3. Invoke matlab2tikz by

    >> matlab2tikz();

    or

    >> matlab2tikz('Plot1.tex');

  4. Add the contents of Plot1.tex into your LaTeX source code; a convenient way of doing so is to use \input{/path/to/Plot1.tex}. Also make sure that at the header of your document the Pgfplots package is included:

    \documentclass{article}
\usepackage{pgfplots}
% and optionally (as of Pgfplots 1.3):
\pgfplotsset{compat=newest}
\pgfplotsset{plot coordinates/math parser=false}
\newlength\figureheight
\newlength\figurewidth

\begin{document}
 \input{Plot1.tex}

    \end{document}

Amazing, right?

If you experience bugs, have nice examples of what matlab2tikz can do, or if you are just looking for more information, please visit the web page of matlab2tikz https://github.com/nschloe/matlab2tikz.

In conclude, in this post I introduced 3 methods about how to insert Matlab figure into Latex.

  1. Save as .eps file, is most easy and quickly. But if you need very strict requirement for the figure text, size, line style, it will not satisfy you.
  2. Edit the .eps file in AI. It’s powerful edit any element in AI. If you just write an article, it will be good enough. But if you have a lot of picture, you must spend a lot of time to edit each picture.
  3. Export Matlab figure to TikZ code. Sometimes it will be efficient, and it’s free. But you need spend time to learn TikZ, and sometimes the convert will not work as you wanted.