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To turn the y-axis label upside down in Matplotlib, pass rotation=180 to ax.set_ylabel(). This rotates the label text only. It does not reverse the direction of the y-axis or change the plotted data. If your goal is for y values to increase downward, you need a different setting, covered below.
Rotate the label text with rotation=180
Use the object-oriented form when you have an Axes object:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
fig, ax = plt.subplots()
ax.plot([1, 2, 3], [10, 20, 15])
ax.set_ylabel("Value", rotation=180)
plt.show()The pyplot equivalent acts on the current axes:
plt.ylabel("Value", rotation=180)Both calls pass rotation through as a Text property. Matplotlib measures rotation in degrees, and positive angles run counterclockwise. A value of 180 therefore produces upside-down lettering while the label stays on the left side of the plot. The behaviour is documented in the Axes.set_ylabel API reference and in the text properties and layout tutorial.
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Rotating the label is not the same as inverting the axis
Readers who ask how to “flip” a y-axis often mean one of two different things. The table separates them.
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| Goal | What changes | Code |
|---|---|---|
| Upside-down label text | Only the lettering of the axis title | ax.set_ylabel("Value", rotation=180) |
| Y values increase downward | Direction of the y-axis; tick positions and plotted points move | ax.invert_yaxis() or ax.set_yinverted(True) |
Inverting the axis is documented in the Axes.set_yinverted API reference. Use it only when the reversed scale is the intended result. Using both settings together is valid, but each one controls a separate thing.
Other label options to set alongside rotation
- labelpad sets the gap between the label and the Axes bounding box, which includes tick marks and tick labels. If the default spacing looks cramped after rotation, increase it. The default comes from the
axes.labelpadrc setting, which is 4 points in the stock configuration. - loc positions the label along the axis. Accepted values are
"bottom","center", and"top". It is independent of rotation.
A combined example:
ax.set_ylabel("Value", rotation=180, labelpad=8, loc="center")Check the result in your own figure
The examples above follow the Matplotlib stable documentation as published at the time of writing, which lists the 3.11 series. Label placement can shift with figure size, font, and tick-label width, so render the figure and confirm the label sits where you expect. If the label is clipped, increase the figure width or the labelpad value, or save with fig.savefig(..., bbox_inches="tight").
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