# \`Plots\` or otherwise?

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/plots-or-otherwise/104162>\
**Category:** Visualization\
**Tags:** question, plotting\
**Created:** [September 22, 2023, 6:06pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/plots-or-otherwise/104162 "2023-09-22T18:06:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 3

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**Author:** ![goerz](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/goerz/32/3269_2.png) [@goerz](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/goerz)\
**Post date:** [September 22, 2023, 6:22pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/plots-or-otherwise/104162/3 "2023-09-22T18:22:01Z")

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> [@ryofurue](#):
>
> `Plots` do almost everything and is it just a documentation problem?

No `Plots` definitely doesn’t do everything. Personally, I’ve found `Plots` to be the perfect plotting package for exploration. That is, to quickly look at things while I’m doing research, e.g., in a Jupyter Notebook. The package syntax is just very short and flexible. The multiple backends also come in handy. One of my favorites is [UnicodePlots](https://github.com/JuliaPlots/UnicodePlots.jl), which I love to use as part of running package tests in the terminal (but then switch to a different backend if I really need to see details).

However, `Plots` is not very good when you need extreme customization, most likely for generating plots for published papers. Personally, I’m still finding Python’s [matplotlib](https://matplotlib.org) unsurpassed, although [Makie](https://makie.org) [looks interesting](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/how-customizable-is-makie/101185) if you’re looking for something in pure Julia.

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