How can I change the gridline color without changing the tick and tick label colors in MATLAB?

When I execute the following lines of code:

h= plot(rand(1, 100));
grid on
set(gca, 'XColor', 'r')

the color of the X-axis gridlines, X tick-marks and X tick-labels all become red.

I would like to selectively change the color of the gridlines alone, without changing the color of the X tick-marks and X tick-labels.

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

The gridline color cannot be changed without affecting the tick-mark and tick-label colors in MATLAB prior to R2014b .

*In MATLAB R2014a and prior *you can work around this issue by plotting lines of the desired color on top of your figure using PLOT. The following example demostrates this approach:

h= plot(rand(1, 100));
hold on
grid on
% Obtain the tick mark locations
xtick = get(gca,'XTick'); 
% Obtain the limits of the y axis
ylim = get(gca,'Ylim');
% Create line data
X = repmat(xtick,2,1);
Y = repmat(ylim',1,size(xtick,2));
% Plot line data
plot(X,Y,'r')

After executing the above code, the color of the X-axis gridlines remain red, whereas the X tick-marks and X tick-labels are black.

In MATLAB R2014b and later you can set the 'GridColor' property of the axes to a desired value:

grid on
ax = gca;

ax.GridColor = [0.1, 0.1, 0.1];  % [R, G, B]

Please refer to the following documentation link:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/matlab.graphics.axis.axes-properties.html#d120e55810

[Russell]

Really? This is the solution? $5k for a single seat and you can't make a basic plot formatting change like adding light grey grid lines without making all the labels light grey? I will never understand why MatLab costs so much...

[Bobby]

Agreed. So instead as another option I have to export the picture (without a grid), bring it in powerpoint and then draw gray lines? This seems like an absolute basic plot function. I mean even EXCEL can do it.

[chlor thanks]

Just after I figure out how to add gridlines and now I am redoing everything because of this....

[PKP25A]

Ridiculous.

[Image Analyst]

PKP25A, see my solution below for R2014b and later.

Answer 2

[Image Analyst]

To do it in R2014b and later, try this:

y = sin([1:40]/10);
plot(y, 'm*-');
grid on;
ax = gca % Get handle to current axes.
ax.XColor = 'r'; % Red
ax.YColor = 'b'; % Blue
ax.GridAlpha = 0.9;  % Make grid lines less transparent.
ax.GridColor = [0.1, 0.7, 0.2]; % Dark Green.

Answer 3

[Jos (10584)]

People might be interested in creating their own grid using my GRIDXY function I submitted many years ago to the File Exchange. An example:

gridxy(get(gca,'xtick'),get(gca,'ytick'),'color',[.6 .6 .6],'linewidth',1)

[LEE]

thanks! this way is useful and make gridx/y separate so 'gridxy(get(gca,'tick'),'color',[.95 .95 .95],'linewidth',1)'can not work can you make the command more concise.

Answer 4

[muhammed]

really. So, it is not possible to change gridline color to 2013 version !. I mean black and dotted way

[Sarang Kunte]

You can change the GridColor property of an 'axes' to change the color of the grid lines in MATLAB R2014b or later. For earlier versions the above mentioned workaround can be used.

Answer 5

[Wagih Abu Rowin]

ax = gca; ax.GridLineStyle = '--'; ax.GridColor = [0.1, 0.1, 0.1]; grid on